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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24992425">you can try, you can try (the thorns still cut your careful hands)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/sesquidpedalian/pseuds/sesquidpedalian'>sesquidpedalian</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Dr. Stone Week 2020 [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dr. STONE (Anime)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst with a Happy Ending, Aromantic, Emotional Constipation, Families of Choice, Friendship, Hanahaki Disease, Language of Flowers, Medical Inaccuracies, Multi, NOW AGGRESSIVELY EDITED, Other, POV Multiple, Platonic Relationships, THEY DO NOT GET TOGETHER AT THE END OF THIS, Unrequited Love, more specifically a modified version of hanahaki, senku is aroace in this, the ace part doesn't really come up though, the happy ending is NOT ROMANCE, we're going to pretend that the timeline of this fic makes even the slightest amount of sense</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 03:20:28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>20,642</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24992425</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/sesquidpedalian/pseuds/sesquidpedalian</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Gen is sick with wanting. He wants so fiercely it makes thorns lance through his chest, and it’s going to burn out of him if he doesn’t do something about it soon.</p>
<p>For Dr. Stone Week 2020 Day Two: Nature - Found Family, Flowers, Wings</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Asagiri Gen &amp; Chrome, Asagiri Gen &amp; Ishigami Senku &amp; Chrome &amp; Kohaku, Asagiri Gen &amp; Ishigami Senkuu, Asagiri Gen &amp; Kohaku, Asagiri Gen/Ishigami Senkuu (one-sided)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Dr. Stone Week 2020 [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2078955</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>70</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Dr. Stone Week 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>you can try, you can try (the thorns still cut your careful hands)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>i really didn't mean for this to be so long. you might be wondering how this happened, and honestly i'd love to know that too. the working title for this fic was "me??? projecting???? no...... (yes.....)" so that should give you an idea how much this was designed to cater to my incredibly niche interests. you've been warned. </p>
<p>uh to anyone who knows literally anything about japanese florigraphy / human biology / neuroscience / attachment theory / the history of atomic theory, i'm so sorry</p>
<p>i took the flower meanings from <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanakotoba">here</a>. it's a wikipedia page with no citations so i suppose i may as well have just made it up, but at least it keeps things consistent.</p>
<p>title from "hanahaki (bloom)" by molly ofgeography</p>
<p>EDITED 2020/12/28: AT LAST, AN UPDATE FOR MY INCREDIBLY NICHE AUDIENCE OF LITERALLY JUST ME. (Kidding. I see you, all you people who've left kudos and comments. I appreciate it.) Uhhhh this took me like eight months because I wasn't really happy with the first iteration of this story. I've now been looking at it for so long that I genuinely can't tell if I like this new version any better, but I hope, if nothing else, this story will provide you with a temporary, pleasant distraction from whatever it is you seek distraction from.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>At first, the wanting isn’t a physical pain. It settles into his bones, yes, itches under his skin, certainly, but it is more an awareness of lack than a true aching, more preemptive hollowness than real hunger. </p>
<p>For a while, he ignores it. There is not much that can be done about these things, least of all in the stone world. Thinking about it would only feed the flame, so he distracts himself. He performs little tricks for the village children, who marvel at his particular brand of non-scientific sorcery. He collects herbs with the elders, who share gossip and wisdom in the same breath. He tells Kohaku and Chrome tiny pearls of stories hoarded from his old life, ones he always thought he’d never speak of again. (Later, he tells them to Senku too, just for the way Senku narrows his eyes when he’s listening intently, and occasionally reciprocates with his own tales.)</p>
<p>When the tickling sensation in Gen’s throat gets too much, when the first petals burst out like neon signs pointing straight at all his greatest weaknesses, when he recognizes the darkness dripping out of his mouth as <em> Fritillaria camschatcensis</em>, he learns what a curse this kind of hunger is.</p>
<p>He starts triple-checking that he’s smiling with all his teeth, makes sure his eyes match the motion because Kohaku will see right through him if he lets her. He shuts up around Chrome because Chrome is the easiest to lie to, and that will make him careless. But Gen stays close to Senku, orbiting like he is the unchanging centre of the universe, because Senku… Well.</p>
<p>Gen’s not going to lie to himself. That achieves nothing. Senku is the reason he’s coughing up petals in the first place. He wants so fiercely it makes thorns lance through his chest, and it’s going to burn out of him if he doesn’t do something about it soon. </p>
<p>The reasons are too many to count.</p>
<p>One reason:</p>
<p>Chrome is the more expressive one of their little science team. First to laugh, first to shout, first to cry, but Senku’s eyes follow his outbursts with amusement and what Gen is willing to bet is curiosity. He is forever watching. There is something to be learned there, too.</p>
<p> One day, Senku says to Chrome, “Derivative of x squared plus three x minus four, all to the power of negative three.”</p>
<p>Chrome goes still, his hands freezing on a test tube. Gen watches from the corner of the lab.</p>
<p>“Does he know that kind of math?” Gen asks. </p>
<p>Senku tilts his chin up, proud as a peacock. “Don’t worry, I taught him. He knows.”</p>
<p>Gen looks back at Chrome. His thinking face makes him seem incredibly constipated. “He’s not as fast as you, that’s for sure.”</p>
<p>“Hey, I’m <em> learning</em>!” Chrome puts in, his focus broken for a second in favour of indignation.</p>
<p>Gen puts his hands up, smiling. “I know, I know. You’ll probably be quicker than dear Senku here soon, if you keep practicing like this.” </p>
<p>Chrome settles immediately, pleased.</p>
<p>“Be quiet and let him solve the question,” Senku says mildly, his lopsided smile rendering the words meaningless beneath the sudden bloom of giddiness somewhere in Gen’s chest.</p>
<p>“It’s a good test of skill,” Gen maintains for the simple sake of arguing. “He should learn to do mental math quickly even if there are distractions in the room.”</p>
<p>“Distractions, huh? Like a certain annoying mentalist who is apparently convinced he can’t do basic differential calculus?”</p>
<p>“<em>Annoying</em>? You wound me, Senku dear.” Gen pretends to swoon. </p>
<p>Senku’s smile sharpens, which really should not snare Gen’s attention the way it does. “I can do much worse, you scheming—” </p>
<p>“Got it!” Chrome interrupts, throwing a fist in the air. In a breathless rush, he declares, “Applying chain rule, you get negative three times x squared plus three x minus four to the power of negative four, and then that’s multiplied with two x plus three, and because the four is a constant, its derivative is zero and it goes away.”</p>
<p>“Correct. Ten billion points,” Senku says, giving Chrome a thumbs up.</p>
<p>“Obviously!” Chrome shouts, elated. The contents of the test tube in his hand slosh dangerously. “I’m the best at math in this whole village!”</p>
<p>Senku laughs like it was startled out of him, ringing with all the delight of a little kid presented with a brand new video game. He opens his mouth to fire off another question, and Gen’s own smile splits his face, wide enough to hurt.</p>
<p>Another reason:</p>
<p>“Hey, Chrome, come look at this.”</p>
<p>The lab again. A steady constant to all their days.</p>
<p>“Huh? What’s that?”</p>
<p>Senku’s grin could, for the generously-minded, be described as devilish, and yet Gen still wants to grab that face and <em> stare</em>, stare and stare until he has every tooth and dimple memorized.</p>
<p>“I made Gen another batch of cola—” Gen swipes one of the two bottles on the table, manages to coo his thanks without tripping on the syllables “—and I wanted to test something.” Senku waves Chrome over. </p>
<p>Chrome blinks at the remaining bottle, then at Senku, then back again. “Okay? What are we doing?”</p>
<p>“Look.” Senku unscrews the cap, shoves it into Chrome’s hands. “In there.”</p>
<p>“What am I looking for?” he asks, tilting his head and shutting one eye to peer closer.</p>
<p>Faster than Gen knew he could move, Senku drops three round objects into the bottle, and sugary carbonated water shoots out, right into Chrome’s face.</p>
<p>“What the <em> hell</em>?” Chrome screams, dropping the bottle. It shatters in an explosion of glass shards and foam. Chrome darts away to the other side of the lab like a half-drowned cat and yells, “What was that for!”</p>
<p>Senku, bent nearly double, is too busy cackling to respond.</p>
<p>Gen hides his laughter behind one hand, his eyes following Senku as Chrome chases his fellow scientist out of the lab, screeching curses all the while. Gen takes a sip of his cola. </p>
<p>It’s average at best. </p>
<p>Somewhere outside the lab, Chrome’s yelling is still audible. </p>
<p>Gen considers the bottle. Any version of this drink Senku makes probably won’t ever live up to Gen’s memories of the store-bought variety, because it’s not like Gen’s immune to rosy retrospection. (Outdoors, Chrome demands for explanation are briefly cut off by someone asking a question.) The past will not be outcompeted, but the simplified little drawing on the front and the fact that Senku somehow cooled it until beads of condensation collected on the glass more than make up for any shortcomings in flavour.</p>
<p>“Tell me what that was! How did that happen!”</p>
<p>“It’s because those things I added were surfactants!” Senku’s voice calls, ragged from exertion.</p>
<p>“What does that mean!” </p>
<p>The shouting match continues for some time.</p>
<p>By the time Chrome and Senku return, now with Suika in tow, Gen has made decent inroads on his cola. He lifts the bottle and points. “Is this you, Senku dear?”</p>
<p>“Yep. You like it?”</p>
<p>“Cute,” Gen murmurs. He crouches down to show Suika when she bounds over, bright with curiosity. She nods approvingly.</p>
<p>“It looks nice!” she decides.</p>
<p>“Who knew?” Gen teases, tapping the sketch. “There’s some artistry in our dear Senku after all. You’ve never looked more adorable.”</p>
<p>Senku scrunches his nose, unable to hide his amusement, and Gen discovers himself a liar.</p>
<p>Another:</p>
<p>They’re not in the lab for once. Senku lures Gen out into the early afternoon sunlight with a dangerous smile and the promise of ‘something exciting.’</p>
<p>“I’ve been learning from Kohaku,” he says when they reach the edge of the woods. He sets his hand on a low branch on a nearby tree and hoists himself up with surprisingly limited flailing. Gen watches as he scrambles all the way upright. “Come on.” Senku leans down and offers a hand.</p>
<p>Gen takes it, feels the calluses of Senku’s hand, all rough, dry heat as it squeezes and pulls Gen up onto the branch. For less than a second (or maybe for forever) they’re standing so close that Gen could count Senku’s eyelashes. There is a flush of colour and a faint sheen of sweat on Senku’s face, and <em> want </em> floods Gen like a kick in the gut. </p>
<p>It’s a good thing he has practice not flinching.</p>
<p>Then Senku turns away and starts climbing, head tilting this way and that as he tries to determine the best path up. Gen recovers himself enough to ask what all of this is about, and whether dear Senku is absolutely certain he can make it to the top of the tree without falling off and dying a horrible, painful death.</p>
<p>“I’ll be fine. It’s just a matter of finding the right path.” He’s reached the point where the branches seem barely sturdy enough to hold his weight. He tugs sharply at one and it breaks with a snap. “And a fall from this high probably won’t even kill me.”</p>
<p>“<em>Probably</em>.” Gen shakes his head and follows slowly behind, dizzy with the easy way Senku moves, all fluttering cloth and the suggestion of muscle despite his skinny frame.</p>
<p>It’s an absurdly tall tree. By the time the two of them stop, they can see above the forest canopy. </p>
<p>Senku, one hand on the tree trunk, points out at the horizon. “Look at that! I saw it yesterday from the mountainside with Chrome.”</p>
<p>Gen looks in the direction Senku points. “Is that…?”</p>
<p>“A waterfall!” Senku laughs, mad-scientist-style, and grins down at Gen. </p>
<p>The afternoon light makes a halo of his hair, but this isn’t an angel, Gen reminds himself, just some stupid brilliant boy, glowing at him like he has nothing better to do than be here with Gen, bright as gold, after stealing all the beauty out of the rest of the world. </p>
<p>“You can see the white plumes of the water from all the way over here. Pretty cool, right?” His attention is fixed on the far-off foam and thunder of the falls.</p>
<p>“Pretty cool,” Gen echoes helplessly. He could keep looking forever.</p>
<p>He doesn’t know when it starts, but one day, Senku smiles a bit too wide, or watches Gen a bit too keenly, or talks a bit too long about the many intricacies of rocket science, eyes shining, hands fluttering, and Gen has to make his excuses and dart outside, petals tumbling out of his mouth. Watching them fall, Gen thinks of starlight, and molten metal, and summer storms.</p><hr/>
<p>Something about the light changes the moment Kohaku interrupts their work.</p>
<p> “Guys,” she says, shadow falling over them from the doorway.</p>
<p>“What is it?” Senku asks. His hands don’t falter. </p>
<p>Chrome, entranced with watching the colours in the flask bubble up and dissipate, hears more than sees Kohaku make her way over to where he and Senku are observing their latest experiment.</p>
<p>“When’s the last time you saw Gen?” And her tone, all business, tears Chrome’s attention away instantly, colours and proper end point be damned. </p>
<p>She only sounds like that when someone’s dying.</p>
<p>Senku, for his part, either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care. He keeps an eye on carefully etched markings in the glass. “Four days ago. Why?”</p>
<p>“That’s not at all suspicious to you?” </p>
<p>“He survived in the Kingdom of Might on his own for months—he can take care of himself. What am I, his keeper?” He raises an eyebrow at the burette, swirls the contents of the beaker positioned underneath it. “Okay, that should be good. About…seventeen point one millilitres. Chrome, we’ll need to do a few more trials.”</p>
<p>Chrome nods, shoots a vaguely apologetic look at Kohaku, who only stares back, eyes dark and steely. “I can do this next one.” </p>
<p>He takes Senku’s place on the other side of the table, sets to cleaning and rinsing out the equipment. They’re a good team. Senku moves out of the way, all his focus switching to Kohaku.</p>
<p>“What are you looking for him for?” he asks, stretching his arms above his head.</p>
<p>“I think he has hanahaki disease.”</p>
<p>Senku breathes in, sharp, and Chrome nearly spills acid on himself. </p>
<p>“<em>What</em>?” </p>
<p>“It’s the best guess I have.” Kohaku spits her words out quick and vicious. “He comes and goes, sure, but he doesn’t disappear for more than three days at a time. Ever. I’ve been keeping an eye on him, just—just in case.” </p>
<p>Chrome grits his teeth, bites down on the urge to say something. He doesn’t know what he wants to say, anyway. </p>
<p>“It’s been four days and I can’t find him <em> anywhere</em>. He knows I watch him—he never lets this much time pass without coming to talk to me, and lately I’ve been finding petals in the woods, in places they shouldn’t be. Little piles of them, always buried. If it’s not him, <em> someone’s </em> trying to hide something from us.”</p>
<p>“Okay, the titration can wait,” Senku says, as if this isn’t perfectly obvious. He turns and starts tidying up with an efficiency borne of years of practice. Chrome doesn’t notice his own hands are curled into fists until Senku tells him to set the beaker down before he shatters it.</p>
<p> “Where did you see him last?” Chrome asks, heartbeat thrumming in his ears. “Where have you looked already?” </p>
<p>“Last time was just outside the lab. He was making fake blood, he said. I’ve looked everywhere in the clearing and about a hundred paces into the woods on all sides. Asked around the village too. No one’s seen him.”</p>
<p>“I can check the river,” Chrome volunteers.</p>
<p>“I’ll ask around the village again,” Senku says, putting away the last of the glassware.</p>
<p>Kohaku nods decisively. “I’ll get the guards to help me search the forest and mountains.”</p>
<p>“Meet back here at sunset—”</p>
<p>A new shadow crosses the threshold of the lab.</p>
<p>“Senku, dear! No one told me we were having a meeting.” Gen strolls in, smiling like there’s nowhere else he ought to be. “Where have you been, dear Kohaku?”</p>
<p>Kohaku whirls on him. “Where have <em> I </em> been?” she yells. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” She grabs him by the shoulders, and Gen leans away, blinking rapidly, the very picture of alarm. Her voice softens worryingly fast. “Are you okay?”</p>
<p>It’s not a big deal, usually, where Gen does or does not go, but Chrome’s heart is thudding somewhere in his throat right now, and the other two don’t seem to be faring any better. He’s okay, right? He has to be.</p>
<p>“I’m perfectly fine,” Gen chirps, ducking out of Kohaku’s hold. His eyes rake over them. </p>
<p>Kohaku looks like she wants to give him a good shake and Chrome wouldn’t be far behind. Senku’s expression is unreadable, the whole of him one tense line, but Gen must see something in it, because the smile drops off his face like a discarded mask. “Ah. So you know.”</p>
<p>“Yeah.”</p>
<p>Gen bows, and from somewhere—Chrome blinks at the wrong second, misses how it happens—produces a bouquet of fresh flowers, nightshade and camellias, tied in a strip of torn purple fabric. There’s blood on the petals. </p>
<p>He offers the arrangement to Senku.</p>
<p>Senku’s words come out flat as he takes the flowers. “You <em> idiot</em>.”</p>
<p>“You’re breaking my heart, dear.” Gen’s doing that voice that makes it impossible to tell if he means what he’s saying.</p>
<p>“How am I supposed to make use of you when you’re in this state?” Senku huffs, points. “On the table. Sit. Take off your coat so I can check the disease’s progression so far.” Clinical, steady if you ignore how bright Senku’s eyes are. He gives the flowers a once-over, sets them down on a nearby shelf. Chrome steps forward to help. </p>
<p>As Senku goes, he talks. </p>
<p>“If you’re coughing up whole flowers, the disease is way too far along. You should have told me about this <em> weeks </em> ago. The point is that we <em> help </em> each other, mentalist. Blood on the petals, so we’re past the point of surgery being viable even if we did have the anesthetics and tools. Here, this could be a useful sample. Chrome—”</p>
<p>“Got it.” </p>
<p>Kohaku glides out of the way, stands at the entrance like a ghost-silent sentry. Chrome hands Senku a pair of gloves, a mask, and then gets a set for himself. Senku grunts his thanks, grabs a beaker to use as a stethoscope.</p>
<p>“Take a deep breath.”</p>
<p>“That’ll be a bit difficult, what with the flowers in my lungs and the proximity to you.” Gen’s voice is downright sing-song and Chrome wants to scream. “You know, you steal my breath away, my dear.”</p>
<p>“How can you talk like that? You get that you’re <em> dying</em>, right?” Chrome shouts, and gods, he didn’t mean to, and the flicker of emotion that crosses Senku’s face is more than enough to make him regret it, but Gen is just sitting there like nothing is wrong! </p>
<p>It’s not like Ruri. Ruri, who had a whole village to look after, Ruri, who could fell lions with the force of her gentle smiles even as blood stained her shaking hands, Ruri who survived so long that her actually dying stopped feeling like such a threat at some point without Chrome even noticing—</p>
<p>It’s not like Ruri’s situation at all, but he knows what lungs on the verge of giving out sound like from experience, and he and Gen aren’t friends, exactly, not the way Gen and Senku are, but this is a whole person’s life! Like <em> hell </em> if Chrome’s about to let anyone dismiss it as if it’s nothing.</p>
<p>Gen reaches out, fingertips inches from caressing Chrome’s face.</p>
<p>“Oh, sweet Chrome,” he coos. “There was no need to worry about me. I was handling things quite well, until…” Gen beams in Kohaku’s direction, all honey and teeth. “But you’ve found out now.” This last part he directs to Senku, leaning forward until the two of them are almost nose-to-nose. “I don’t have a choice anymore. I leave myself entirely in your hands, Senku dear.”</p><hr/>
<p>Senku knows how to plan ahead. He has extra stores of the sulfa drug, just in case, and he asked Yuzuriha to teach him how to sew, just in case, and, hell, he’s built a <em> crossbow </em>before, once when worry knawed at him until he couldn’t bring himself to sleep, but he also knows there are things he isn’t going to think of, because humans are squishy little idiots like that.</p>
<p>He didn’t think of this. </p>
<p>
  <em> Quit berating yourself. Focus. </em>
</p>
<p>“I don’t love him,” he says, staring at the dried dirt in the shade of the tree they’re sitting under.</p>
<p>Chrome shifts uncomfortably in his spot on a tree root nearby. “I thought you guys liked each other.”</p>
<p>“I don’t <em> love </em> him.” Senku isn’t looking, but he can imagine the lost puppy expression that follows. “I <em> don’t</em>.”</p>
<p>“He’s not that bad, is he?” Kohaku’s squinting at him, mouth set in an unhappy line. She’d delivered Gen to one of the huts in the village proper to rest and returned a few moments ago to settle cross-legged on the ground. “There’re stories. It doesn’t happen often, but you could try…” She struggles briefly for the words. “Romance. A relationship. That’s been enough, sometimes.”</p>
<p>“I know.” He does know, and he can guess where this leads, where this ends. He’s gotten good at predicting.</p>
<p>“So?”</p>
<p>“Whether I like Gen isn’t the problem. I’m aromantic. It means—”</p>
<p>“You’re immune to hanahaki!” Chrome gasps, eyes wide. “But what does that have to do with liking Gen?”</p>
<p>If nothing else, Chrome is still Chrome, and that warms Senku in a way he’ll never admit. </p>
<p>“My dad really managed to pack a lot of info into those tales, eh? He tried his best to understand, but I don’t think he ever really got it. Only so much you can expect from an old man like that. Aromantic doesn’t just mean that I’m immune. It means I don’t fall in love. I couldn’t reciprocate the mentalist’s feelings even if I wanted to.”</p>
<p>“There’s gotta be a cure for hanahaki, though, right? Like the sulfa drugs?” Chrome frowns. “Would the sulfa drugs work on this?”</p>
<p>“Those only work for bacterial infections. As far as modern science knows, this isn’t that.”</p>
<p>“How do you know you don’t like anyone?” Kohaku’s question.</p>
<p>“How do you know you<em> do </em> like anyone?”</p>
<p>She shrugs. Reaching over, she picks up a fallen branch, snaps off a piece, and hands it to Senku. With her own piece, Kohaku scratches meaningless circles in the dirt.</p>
<p>“See the problem?” he says. “Feelings are too subjective to do proper science with most of the time. Neither of us, no one, really, can exactly run an experiment on who we don’t like or who we do like. How do you know what romantic love is supposed to feel like? What if your feelings change in the middle of the experiment and you don’t notice? How do you prove a <em> lack </em> of attraction?” </p>
<p>“You’d probably find a way. You and your science knowledge.” She wrinkles her nose at him. Senku knows by now that that’s Kohaku-speak for ‘you’re ridiculous, but I believe in you.’</p>
<p>“Thanks. I guess I could have scanned my brain and compared it to people who were in love, but what would’ve been the point? It didn’t bother me. Anyway, if it turns out I’m wrong later, then I’ll stop calling myself aromantic. For now, this is the term that best matches the evidence available.”</p>
<p>“All right,” she concedes easily enough. “You mentioned something about a surgery, earlier. Your modern world have any other miracle cures?” Studiously flat voice. Practical, not sentimental. </p>
<p>Senku can’t look at her. He likes her for a reason, after all. A bird twitters high out of sight in the branches above them.</p>
<p>“Wait, wait, wait, back up,” Chrome says, waving his hands. “You <em> must </em> have tried to test this aromantic thing. If there’s anything I know about you, Senku, it’s that you wouldn’t just decide that and leave it. What’s the proof?”</p>
<p>Senku chuckles. “I just said there wasn’t any proof, idiot.” He stops. Remembers smaller hands. A bigger world. Possibility coiled like a promise in the pages he read as a child. </p>
<p>“What?”</p>
<p>Senku shakes his head. “It’s not important.” </p>
<p>“C’mon, tell me! I wanna know!” Chrome gets his own stick and pokes at Senku’s leg.</p>
<p>He swats back without heat. “Why?”</p>
<p>Kohaku: “Leave it alone, Chrome.”</p>
<p>“I just wanna know. Tell me!” And Chrome leans forward eagerly, nearly tips over, but he almost definitely means it completely. It’s like he’s never even heard of ulterior motives.</p>
<p>“It’s just something I remembered a few seconds ago. An...experiment I did when I was a kid. I tried kissing a bunch of people—” Senku lifts his hands in sardonic air quotes “—‘in the interest of scientific inquiry.’”</p>
<p>Chrome laughs. Kohaku suppresses a snort. </p>
<p>“Did it work?”</p>
<p>“Depends what you mean by work,” he says wryly, letting the distraction sweep him along for now. “Some people agreed to let me try, probably because we were too young back then to really feel anything besides curiosity about it, but more than one of them definitely slapped me.”</p>
<p>“Nice going,” Kohaku manages to mutter, before she and Chrome exchange glances and start giggling.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Senku mutters, putting his finger in his ear. “It was pretty dumb. After that, I figured the fact that I didn’t even really want to kiss them or have anything to do with romance was reasonable enough evidence. Or, at least, a reason not to try again for a long time. There’s way more interesting stuff to do than worry about that.”</p>
<p>“Did you ever end up trying again?” Chrome’s question, but Kohaku is watching intently.</p>
<p>Senku lifts one shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. “Not really. I still don’t entirely get it. Seems to work pretty well for you guys though, however illogical it is.” He starts drawing a line in the dirt at their feet. He can’t waste any more time. “How often does hanahaki appear in the Hundred Tales?” he asks them.</p>
<p>Chrome turns to Kohaku, waiting. She rolls her eyes and shoves him lightly. “My sister being priestess doesn’t mean <em> I </em> know all the tales by heart.”</p>
<p>“Well, it’s uncommon, right? It doesn’t happen to everyone that falls in love.”</p>
<p>“We’d be screwed if it did,” Senku says, feeling the corner of his mouth twitch up.</p>
<p>“The person coughs up petals at first, and then flowers, and then blood as it gets worse. They die in a few months.” Chrome’s gone sober, quiet, watching Senku scratch marks at regular intervals along the line in the dirt.</p>
<p>“Depends on the person.” Senku inspects his work. The line is a little wobbly in the middle. “About eight to ten months is the average, but people have survived years with it.” Draws petals on the far left. “Not that we want to rely on that.” A skull on the far right. “The prevailing theory is it’s something to do with unusually intense limerence.”</p>
<p>“Limerence?” Kohaku’s impatience shows only in the way she leans forward, like being closer will pull the answers out of him. Magnetic.</p>
<p>“A state of being in love to the point of obsession. I don’t know a lot about it. It’s complicated and insufficiently researched.” Somewhere about three-fifths of the way along the line, Senku draws a flower in full bloom.</p>
<p>“You? Really? Not knowing something?”</p>
<p>Three-quarters, a simplified droplet.</p>
<p>“Whatever, just tell us more!” Chrome demands.</p>
<p>“Your brain chemistry changes when you’re that in love with someone. The research got about far enough to figure that out, and then…” Senku adds one last line to his drawing. “Then the petrification event happened.” He jabs the stick into the dirt, marking a spot on the timeline he’s drawn. “This is where the mentalist is. Coughing up blood. By this point, in the modern world, he’d have to either take medicine for it or go talk to a psychologist.”</p>
<p>“A psychologist…” Kohaku repeats slowly.</p>
<p>“It won’t work—none of us have the training for it and it wasn’t exactly a billion percent reliable even back then. I have some rough ideas how to we might make the medication, but the majority will have to trial-and-error.”</p>
<p>When he looks up again, Chrome is staring at him with shining eyes, and Kohaku’s on her feet. “Sounds like a challenge.” Kohaku’s words.</p>
<p>“Yeah. It will be. We’re racing against the clock here.” Senku remembers something and smiles. “It will be a lot of ultra-hard work.”</p>
<p>“Like that’s ever stopped us!” Chrome grins.</p>
<p>Kohaku helps Senku up. “We’re ready. Let’s do this.” </p><hr/>
<p>Kohaku is on her way through the village to drop off a basket of food when Chrome careens into her with a loud yelp. With one hand, she grabs him by the back of his shirt and yanks him upright. </p>
<p>“Watch where you’re going.”</p>
<p>“I know where I’m going. I was looking for you.”</p>
<p>“Don’t you have work to do?” It comes out harsher than she means it to.</p>
<p>“I <em> know</em>,” Chrome repeats. He makes an complicated face as he runs a hand through his hair—it’s always managed to be a bit too long, but he sticks his tongue out at her whenever she suggests cutting it and pointedly tightens his headband. He frowns at the sunset over the rooftops, and falls in step beside her.</p>
<p>“It’s just that it’s been weeks and we haven’t found anything that works and Senku’s getting kind of weird. I—I dunno.” </p>
<p>“The sulfa drugs took way longer than this,” Kohaku says reasonably. “C’mon, Chrome, what’s the point of worrying right now? We have work to do.”</p>
<p>“I think he does like Gen.”</p>
<p>Kohaku snorts. That goes without saying. (Watching those two working together was once like watching a hawk in flight, grace and intelligence and seamless motion contained behind inexplicable miracles and wide, fox-sharp smiles.)</p>
<p>“D’you think he’s being like this because he cares a lot about Gen?” Chrome’s voice has turned soft, oddly hesitant in his curiosity.</p>
<p>“Dunno,” Kohaku mutters, eyes on the dirt path. “I think…” She tries crossing her arms, then frowns when the basket stops her. “I think he’s being an idiot.”</p>
<p>They arrive at the door of the old couple living at the edge of the village, right by the cliffside. Kohaku hands off the basket of fresh fish and mushrooms, stays long enough to return their pleasantries, and then nods at Chrome to lead the way.</p>
<p>“Do you wanna check on Gen?” Chrome asks, swinging his arms as he goes. They’re taking a wandering route through the village.</p>
<p>“I already checked a little while ago.” Kohaku hooks her arm around Chrome’s shoulders, dragging him to a halt. “Okay, what’s wrong with you?”</p>
<p>“I told you already! What were those lioness ears doing, if you weren’t listening? I wanted to come find you.” He shakes his head. “Senku’s being <em> weird</em>.”</p>
<p>“And then you never explained what that means,” she replies flippantly. “What was I supposed to do with that information?” Chrome shoves at her arm, so she pulls him into a headlock, ruffles his hair.</p>
<p>“H-hey, lemme go!” he yelps, flailing. Kohaku does not. He sighs and goes limp, forcing her to haul him along. He waves half-heartedly at one of the villagers who leans out a doorway to greet them. “I don’t know how long it’s been since he’s slept for an entire night. He keeps making this <em> face </em> when I say Gen’s name, and he doesn’t even ask me about calculus anymore!”</p>
<p>“Wow, that sounds awful,” she says, deadpan. “No math for days?”</p>
<p>Chrome pouts at her. “I like math! And stop that. You sound—Ugh, you don’t get it. It was like our bird game, y’know? I’d be worried about you too, if you suddenly stopped wanting to play it for a <em> week</em>.”</p>
<p>Kohaku lets him go and he narrowly avoids tripping over thin air as he regains his balance. “He probably isn’t exactly in the mood for games right now.” She tugs his ear. “Are you really so clueless that you can’t see that yourself?”</p>
<p>Chrome frowns wordlessly at her, bats her hand away, and she knows she’s missing the point.</p>
<p>“He wasn’t like this with Ruri either, was he?” she asks.</p>
<p>“No. But I guess back then we knew what we were doing, it was just a matter of getting there.” His gaze darts to her, almost guilty. “And he didn’t know her the same way. That might’ve been part of it.”</p>
<p>Kohaku doesn’t know what to say to that. “She’s fine now.” The urge to go check flares up before the words are even completely out of her mouth. “Our priority is Gen.”</p>
<p>“Yeah. We’ll get it,” Chrome mutters, quietly determined. “We will. Senku’s just being kinda off right now.”</p>
<p>He sidles closer and bumps shoulders with her. (He hasn’t done that in years. She makes a mental note to stay close to his hut tonight.) She ruffles his hair again and gets no complaints.</p>
<p>“Gen’s being weird too,” Kohaku starts.</p>
<p>“Hm?”</p>
<p>But how to describe it? The stifled desperation in his eyes when she gets up to leave after a late-night talk, the faintly breathless way he asks about the goings-on of the village, the <em> everything </em> when Senku’s name comes up that yanks Kohaku’s heart out and stomps it to pieces on the hard-packed dirt. And still he smiles, every word dripping out of his mouth like nectar as if Kohaku doesn’t know enough by now to be able to tell which of Gen’s smiles are real and which aren’t. </p>
<p>“It’s like he’s...<em> less </em> now. He’s there and it’s still him, but…” </p>
<p>It’s almost like when Ruri became priestess. </p>
<p>Chrome’s squinting at her in confusion. “What the heck does that mean?”</p>
<p>Kohaku kicks the dirt, fights the impulse to run as far and as fast as she can from this place. “I don’t know. Shut up.” She peers up at the sky. “It’s getting dark. Let’s go back.”</p>
<p>For a while, they walk in silence. </p>
<p>“Have you eaten yet?” Kohaku asks eventually.</p>
<p>“Nope. Have you?”</p>
<p>“No. I can catch a fish or two, if you want.” </p>
<p>It will be cleaned quickly, almost carelessly, cooked as they sit around a smoldering fire talking about whatever they can think of, and the meal will fall into a long, blurry river of memory from before all this ‘stone-people-becoming-human’ stuff happened. Kohaku doesn’t miss their shared past, but she’s glad Chrome is still around.</p>
<p>Chrome beams at her. “That’d be great. I’d make ramen but.” He sighs, and suddenly looks much, much older than he should.</p>
<p>“Gods, don’t make that face, you make me feel old and sad just looking at you.”</p>
<p>Chrome’s grin stretches impossibly wider as he stretches his arms over his head in an unmistakably Senku type of movement. She looks in the direction of Gen’s hut without thinking.</p>
<p>“Do you wanna play the bird game?” he asks, following her gaze.</p>
<p>“Right now?”</p>
<p>Chrome shrugs cheerfully. “When else? I think I saw a crow on my way over here.”</p>
<p>“That doesn’t count if I wasn’t around for it! My turn first. I hear…” Kohaku tilts her head, tension bleeding out of her as she listens. “A robin.”</p>
<p>Chrome nods, scanning the village. “There it is, in that nest over there. My turn! Uh...House sparrow. On that rooftop, see?” He points. Her eyes pick it out easily—the plump little creature is silhouetted perfectly against sunset-pink clouds.</p>
<p>“Waxwing.”</p>
<p>“What, really? <em> Where </em>?”</p>
<p>Kohaku laughs, gently hits him on the arm. “It’s your job to find it!”</p>
<p>For the next few minutes, the two of them lose themselves in the precious simplicity of birdsong and feathers. There will be time later for the fish, for the bones and the blood. There will be time for the ache to lodge itself in Kohaku’s head again, right after she thought she was rid of it. Right now, there is a waxwing hidden under the eaves of the house at the edge of the cliffs.</p><hr/>
<p>In the shimmering afternoon heat, Senku stands in front of the hut and does what a scientist does best. Observe. Categorize. Move forward.</p>
<p>The tightness near his throat is because he keeps clenching his jaw. </p>
<p>The stinging in his eyes is because he didn’t sleep enough last night. </p>
<p>The hollow, somewhat queasy sensation in his lower abdomen—he needs to eat. </p>
<p>And he doesn’t remember the last time he got a drink of water, so that accounts for the dryness in his mouth. </p>
<p>The uncomfortable feeling in his chest that verges on painful as he approaches the hut, however, and the looming dread that’s making him clutch the tray of food in his hands tighter than necessary, is entirely Gen’s fault.</p>
<p>
  <em> Move forward. </em>
</p>
<p>He goes into the hut.</p>
<p>The air inside lingers on the wrong side of sweet and heavy. He wants to gag. After the brightness of the midday sun outside, the hut is dim and claustrophobic. Gen is sitting in a little pile of pillows and blankets in the middle of the room’s wood-plank floor, legs crossed, the sound of his breathing too loud even as he converses with two of the villagers in low voices. Gen’s eyes catch him first, and Senku sets the tray down, feeling like a thief.</p>
<p>“Have you been doing what I asked?” he asks them.</p>
<p>“Yes, here are all the flowers he’s coughed up since you last visited, chief.” One of the two villagers, the shorter one with spiked-up hair, holds out a basket. The worry in his eyes looks sincere.</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Senku mutters, sorting through the samples. “You collected individual petals as well?”</p>
<p>“Yes, sir!” The taller one, who Senku is pretty sure is younger, eagerly dumps a well-made pouch into the basket.</p>
<p>“There’s no need to call me that.” He doesn’t fight the smile that tugs at his mouth, just runs a finger along the soft fabric of the pouch and feels himself warming to them. “Did you make this?”</p>
<p>“Yep! I know it’s not as good as Ruby’s, or Sapphire’s, or even Amethyst's—” </p>
<p>The shorter one not-so-subtly elbows the other.</p>
<p>“We’ve talked about this,” he mutters, making very obvious motions with his head in Senku’s direction. The taller one, blushing, visibly changes course.</p>
<p> “Er, I mean, yeah, I made it. Spent a really long time on it too. Um—”</p>
<p>“This is really good,” Senku says, lifting the pouch up to examine more closely. He grins at them, bright as he can make it. “Too bad you’ll probably want this back later, I could think of all kinds of uses for it.”</p>
<p>“Oh, um—!” The villager very nearly squeaks. “I could show you how to make it. I mean, the way I did it. It’s a little different from what the others did—I just wanted to try something out, because I was thinking about how we usually waterproof our bags and things but—”</p>
<p>“Okay, I think that’s all, we’ll leave you to your thing, chief!” The shorter one grabs the taller one by the arm and forcibly removes them from the room.</p>
<p>“Looking forward to working with you,” Senku calls laconically after them. He watches them walk away for a few seconds longer than he needs to.</p>
<p>“What a clever little scientist you are…” Gen pipes up behind him, low and sickly sweet. “Have you ever thought about becoming a mentalist? People would go wild for that genius brain of yours.”</p>
<p>Senku tilts his head to listen in the silence that follows. It’s a check-up; he’s allowed.</p>
<p>“If you’re already having this much trouble breathing, the disease has progressed even further along than I thought,” he says, turning around. “You stupid magician, you hid this from me for way too long.”</p>
<p>“Me? Keep a secret from you, Senku dear?” Gen smiles like a shark and it’s almost normal. “I would <em> never</em>. You’re too smart for me to get away with it.”</p>
<p>
  <em> Who are you, and what have you done with Gen? </em>
</p>
<p>“Sure.”</p>
<p>Senku almost asks if Gen would rather have died than confess to him. He almost admits that that thought pings something dangerously near to relief. He almost bolts from the room, but there’s no way around this and he’s not enough of a coward to run from a patient, from a life he could save. (He’s not going to run from his friend when that friend needs him here.)</p>
<p>“You brought food,” Gen says, softer.</p>
<p>“Yeah.” Senku sits down, forces himself to be within arm’s reach. “I haven’t had lunch yet either.”</p>
<p>Gen gasps in mock delight, though the effect is ruined when he promptly doubles over and hacks up a shower of petals. A few white, blood-speckled flowers—<em> Pecteilis radiata</em>, Senku recognizes them from the florist Yuzuriha once worked at—fall to the floor. Gen wipes his mouth. “Sorry about that! But dear Senku is having lunch with me? Even though he has all kinds of work to do?” Gen claps cheerfully, and reaches for the bowl of soup on the tray. “How wonderful! Tell me, how have you been doing, my dear? It feels like we hardly talk anymore.”</p>
<p>
  <em> Who are you? Why can’t I make sense of you? </em>
</p>
<p>“Stop that.” Senku picks up the bowl of ramen he brought for himself. </p>
<p>Gen makes an innocently inquiring noise, apparently determined to see this through.</p>
<p>“Pretending you’re okay isn’t going to accomplish anything, mentalist. I don’t do romance. You know that.” He can’t look Gen in the eye, but he hears the quiet slurping and the long, thoughtful pause. At least he’s eating.</p>
<p>“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Gen starts, “but I suppose there’s not much point if there’s no audience.” He sighs a rattling breath that Senku has to fight not to react to, and lets the matter go. “I didn’t realize it until I arrived here, but it’s strange not having an audience watching my every move. At some point, my whole life must have become a performance, and I hardly even noticed.”</p>
<p>Senku swallows, too aware of his hands on his chopsticks, too aware that he’s way more focused on the bowl in his lap than his lack of appetite warrants. “Why are you telling me that?”</p>
<p>“I’m a terribly selfish person. You know that. You knew it and you made me my favourite drink anyway. I just think it’d be nice if you stayed a while. Come on, look at me, dear Senku. Won’t you let me see that pretty face properly?” He can hear the fake smile in Gen’s voice. </p>
<p><em> Why did you say that? </em> he thinks. Like a true scientist, he asks it again: <em> Why? Why? </em></p>
<p>Like an aching, tongue-tied idiot, he says, “Let me eat my ramen in peace, mentalist.”</p>
<p>“It’d be nice to have more cola,” Gen muses, setting down his soup. “Will you make me more if I ask nicely?”</p>
<p>The restless, clawing need to get back to work engulfs Senku like a tidal wave. He stays where he is. He reaches over to the tray, picks up the bun one of the older villagers saddled him with on his way to the hut. Tearing it in half, he makes an undignified noise upon finding hot jam in the middle, barely avoiding dropping it on himself. Gen giggles behind one long purple sleeve.</p>
<p>“Here. Eat.” Senku hands Gen half.</p>
<p>Gen bites into the bread like a peace offering.</p><hr/>
<p>It’s the middle of the night when Gen wakes to the sound of an intruder. He breathes slow, keeps his eyes shut, tries not to gag on the blossoms crowding his mouth before he can figure out what to do. At first he thinks of Senku, but no, these steps don’t scuff the dirt the same way. Quick on their feet, but not deathly silent like Tsukasa or Hyoga. They’re approaching slowly—they still think he’s asleep. Should he do something—?</p>
<p>“You’re a really light sleeper, aren’t you?”</p>
<p>Kohaku.</p>
<p>Gen blinks his eyes open, coughs until there’s a new pile of flowers by his pillow. (Kuroyuri, camellias, forget-me-nots—he knows them all by heart.) “Visiting me again?” he says, smoothing the sleep out of his voice. “You even knew I was awake, didn’t you?”</p>
<p>Kohaku settles by his bedroll, her back to him. There is something proud, burning and protective, in the steadiness of her shoulders, in her grip on the knives in her hands. “Your breathing changed,” she explains.</p>
<p>“Ah. Of course.” Gen sighs, and it rattles a few more petals out of him. </p>
<p>Senku will want to collect those, will want to study them, will want to pin these bits of Gen’s life under his gaze like a butterfly to a corkboard— </p>
<p>“It would be different than before, wouldn’t it? To compensate for the reduced lung capacity.” Against these people, had he been their enemy, he wouldn’t stand a chance. “What sharp hearing you have, my dear. You really are like a lioness. Or a big, bad wolf.”</p>
<p>“Shut up.”</p>
<p>“I don’t think I will, Kohaku dear. You showed up at my bedside with knives in your hands in the middle of the night. And poor little me, lying here all defenseless...What should I make of that? Shouldn’t I get ready to scream?”</p>
<p>The way she cants her head probably means she’s rolling her eyes. “You’re an idiot. The cleverest, most deceitful idiot I’ve ever met.” She sheathes her knives and turns to stare down at Gen.</p>
<p>“That’s not very nice,” Gen coos.</p>
<p>She grabs his face and headbutts him.</p>
<p>“Ow! What was that for?” Gen yells. He sits up fast enough to make himself lightheaded, choking on surprise.</p>
<p>“I keep forgetting how loud you can be.” Kohaku blinks at him like this is more important than the fact that she just <em> rammed her head into him</em>.</p>
<p>“What was that for?” Gen repeats, too bewildered and tired to keep his voice down.</p>
<p>“Calm down,” she mutters, shifting to sit closer to him on the blankets. She stretches one leg out, leaves the other bent. Not leaving soon then, and Gen won’t admit that the unraveling in his chest is relief. “It’s, ah, a thing Ruri noticed. Some of the wild cats that live near the village, they headbutt each other sometimes. She always said it was their way of showing affection for each other.”</p>
<p>“How <em> cute</em>,” Gen murmurs, rubbing his forehead. He leans toward her. “Telling me you like me, dear?”</p>
<p>“You don’t need to pretend you’re fine for us. We all know you’re lying.” Her hand, flattened on the sheets, curls tight.</p>
<p>Gen traces his fingers over her knuckles, as distracting a gesture as he can make it. She twitches, and he speaks before she can tell him off. “How strange that you say that. Senku told me something similar not too long ago.”</p>
<p>The way Kohaku frowns at him reads as pity. She starts to say something but Gen interrupts.</p>
<p>“I know, darling. Thinking about him won’t help.” <em> Doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt. </em>“Has it occurred to you that I don’t enjoy this either?”</p>
<p>Kohaku groans, rubs a hand over her face. “You guys are so good at working together and so bad at talking to each other. Gen, I don’t think he <em> knows </em> that.”</p>
<p>“No?” Knowing doesn’t stop the wanting anyway, doesn’t stop the stuttering of his heart, doesn’t stop how his thoughts keep looping back to green-tipped hair and crimson eyes like a child’s tongue to the bloodied gap where a tooth once was. Gen slouches forward, covers his mouth with both hands as he coughs until his palms are coated in bluebell petals.</p>
<p>When he looks up again, Kohaku is watching him with worried eyes.</p>
<p>“Don’t look at me like that,” he murmurs, tapping twice on her knee. “You’ll scare me.”</p>
<p>She turns her head away stiffly. “I’m not looking at you like anything. Just…don’t die yet.”</p>
<p>Gen twirls a single petal between his fingers. </p>
<p>“Will you let me braid your hair, dearest Kohaku?”</p>
<p>She watches the doorway. Not tense, but ready to move, always. Guardian, sentry, protector, her and Kinro and Ginro.</p>
<p>Gen could shift over, just a bit, and their legs would be touching. It wouldn’t accomplish anything.</p>
<p>She says, “I wasn’t going to hurt you.”</p>
<p>“What would you hurt me for anyway, Kohaku? I haven’t done anything wrong.” She squints balefully at him. “So? May I?”</p>
<p>“It doesn’t sound right when you do that,” she says, leaning away from his outstretched hand.</p>
<p>“What doesn’t sound right?” He drops his hand in his lap and remembers the correct way to sit. Back straight, legs tucked close. He tilts his head and raises his eyebrows for good measure.</p>
<p>She flaps her hand at him. “The way you’re talking. It sounds wrong. It doesn’t sound like you.”</p>
<p>“Come on, dear, this is just how I talk.” He nudges her teasingly, hopes she’ll let it go.</p>
<p>“I’ve heard how you talk to the kids, idiot,” she mutters. But then she sighs, and undoes her hair. It falls like a curtain over her shoulders. “Go ahead. Do your thing.”</p>
<p>Gen combs a hand through thick blonde strands, tries to convince himself this is enough. He’ll float out of this mortal body, ghostly and cold and with wind whistling through his hollow bones, and this will be enough.</p>
<p>He only realizes by the end of it that he doesn’t have a mirror around to show off his handiwork.</p>
<p>Kohaku reaches up to pat at the braids curiously. “It feels nice,” she says. She shakes her head experimentally.</p>
<p>Gen quickly grabs her forearm to still her. “Careful, darling! Your hair ties aren’t exactly made for holding braids together. They’ll come undone if you keep moving like that.”</p>
<p>This does not stop her from curiously tracing the patterns in her hair with one finger. She smiles at him, faint, and says, “Thanks.”</p>
<p>“A favour for a favour, okay, dear Kohaku?” he says quietly.</p>
<p>A spark of alertness. “Yeah? What do you need?”</p>
<p>“When I die,” he tells her in that dark, dark room, “plant some nightshade on my grave for me.”</p>
<p>Soon after, she rises to her feet, abrupt but never less than graceful, and leaves. Gen vomits four cherry blossoms onto the pillow, and doesn’t quite have enough air to sigh when she goes. </p>
<p>So that didn’t work either.</p><hr/>
<p>A different night comes, humid and dark, and Senku is back in the hut. He doesn’t stick around when he sees Kohaku hovering near the hut as the sun goes down, but today, she disappeared with the sun’s last rays and Senku hasn’t bothered to find out where to. The Milky Way shines outside like so much misplaced glitter.</p>
<p>“Don’t know how much longer until it’s game over for you at this rate.” Senku puts the stethoscope—somewhat more properly made, less haphazard than just a beaker pressed up against clearly-visible vertebrae—aside. Shifts his weight because he doesn’t <em> know </em> how much longer but he has guesses and they’re all far too low.</p>
<p>“Senku, dear…” Gen breathes out slow, dragging like sugary tar. </p>
<p><em> Move forward</em>.</p>
<p>“What is it, mentalist?” he asks.</p>
<p>“Stay? Talk to me. You have such interesting things to say, darling. Tell me why you always say ‘game over.’”</p>
<p>Point charges, electrostatic repulsion—Senku recoils from the skeletal hand that reaches for him. He and Gen are, taken as a whole, electrostatically neutral, so why does he feel repelled? Why does everything hum with electricity now?</p>
<p>Senku forces the words past his throat, doesn’t quite reach amusement but gets close. “I have stuff to do. Or did you not want the medicine?”</p>
<p>Gen sighs. He makes a noise that might be the start of a sentence, lapses back into tentative silence.</p>
<p>Ernest Rutherford thought that electrons orbited the nucleus of an atom like planets around a star, but the inexorable pull, the impossibly present energy—the orbiting particles would have collided, smashed themselves into nothing. Mutual destruction, and it swims in both their veins. </p>
<p>Senku picks up the basket by the bedside under the pretense of counting the blooms. Gen watches, because his attention is nowhere else these days. </p>
<p>“Why are you still trying to do this at all? I’m not a lost cause yet?”</p>
<p>Senku sets the basket down harder than he needs to and stiffens at the way Gen’s eyes follow the motion. “You’re not dead yet. You’re not lost to us until you’re well and truly dead.” </p>
<p>Gen’s smile is immaculate, constant. He wears his facial expressions like accessories.</p>
<p>“You’re being illogical, my dear. You need to prepare for the winter, and keep working on rebuilding civilization. That’s the far more important thing.” When Senku shakes his head fiercely, Gen continues, “Too noble to cut your losses and leave me? I guess I shouldn’t be surprised anymore.”</p>
<p>Dull, dark eyes. A dull, dark void. All matter collapsing in on itself until Acharya Kanad could never have spoken it into being in the first place. But then Niels Bohr said, <em> maybe these things are fixed</em>, and the world snapped back into existence. Inescapable pull, stable distance.</p>
<p>Senku steps away from the bed.</p>
<p>“I want cola,” Gen says.</p>
<p>Senku mentally notes that the number of flowers Gen’s coughed up in the past few days is significantly greater than the usual, and allows himself five seconds to feel the worry twisting under his ribcage.</p>
<p>“Okay,” he says.</p>
<p><em> God doesn't play dice</em>, said Albert Einstein. Then, he won a Nobel prize for his contributions to quantum mechanics. Senku is balancing lives on the fundamental uncertainty of the universe, and his stomach hollows at the knowledge, the irrefutable proof, as Einstein’s might have: God, if there is one, gambles with glee.</p>
<p>Perhaps Senku is lucky, this time, that he has no gods.</p>
<p>Suddenly, Gen is curled up tight on the bedsheets, coughing hard. Senku helps him sit up, silently hands him a glass of water as he leans back against the wall and shivers. There is a new dusting of blood and soft colours painted around him.</p>
<p>“It’s beautiful, no?” Gen gasps, a faint smile on his face. He draws in on himself until his chin is nearly resting on his knees. He looks smaller than he should.</p>
<p>Senku doesn’t recognize a thing Gen does anymore. Every little cue has disintegrated, the once familiar signals replaced by translucent, blood-spotted flower petals. </p>
<p>He leans down, brushes organic material—chrysanthemum, camellia, sweet pea, he identifies them effortlessly and helplessly—off the bedding, tucks sweat-slicked hair out of Gen’s half-asleep face.</p>
<p><em> Tell me who you are, </em>he thinks. Teetering on the edge of quantum possibility.</p>
<p>“Sure,” he says. It’s late, but there’s work to be done yet. He straightens. The stars through the doorway twinkle like beacons in miniature.</p>
<p>“Senku.” Soft, breathy. It’s like he’s barely there.</p>
<p>“Yeah?”</p>
<p>“You won’t abandon me, will you?” </p>
<p>Senku turns back around. Gen’s eyes are half-lidded, blank. An impression of helplessness, and he has no idea if it’s deliberate.</p>
<p>“Nah. We’re gonna get you this medicine no matter what.” He means it, he <em> does </em>, even if the words grate his mouth on their way out and he can’t stop wanting to flinch at those fathomless eyes. He scans Gen’s face again. Senku isn’t a liar, and Gen knows that. Right?</p>
<p>Gen laughs, low and bitter, waking up. “You’ve never been good at lying to my face. It’s funny, you look so strange in this light, darling.”</p>
<p>“I’m not lying to you,” Senku says. Stepping closer would make it sound more true. Meeting Gen’s eyes would make it sound more true. The most logical thing would be to swallow the confusion on his tongue and remind his friend that he’s not alone here. “Trust me,” he rasps instead.</p>
<p>“I must still be unused to not having streetlights around,” Gen murmurs, his gaze boring into Senku. A ragged exhale, and a few more petals fall. “It’s so dark, and I’ve never seen anyone look more...lost.”</p>
<p>Senku is supposed to laugh at that. A show of bravado, maybe. A joke, a flippant one-liner. It’s not Gen’s fault, after all, that there are dimensions to the human experience Senku never understood. He wonders what makes someone a stranger. He feels stupidly along the gaps in this conversation, and tips himself into chance. “Maybe I am lost, magician. Tell me who you are.”</p>
<p>Gen smiles wider. “I’m still me, my dear. I am who I've always been.” A considering pause, the momentary breath before a cat leaps for its fluttering, grounded prey. “I’m the same insofar as any person can be the same when personality and self are largely imagined concepts we use to soothe ourselves into thinking there is any kind of constant in this wild, unpredictable universe.”</p>
<p>Senku feels like the whole of him is one raw, open wound, ripe for the picking at. Gen is picking at him, paring his skin and muscle to the bone, and he almost smiles anyway. “Cynical.”</p>
<p>A soft, calculated laugh. “Surprised, my dearest Senku? We are very similar. I simply happen to be the better liar.”</p>
<p>“I’m not lying.” There’s nothing else to say, and there is so much to do. Senku gets ready to leave again.</p>
<p>Gen’s hand reaches out. This is not unfamiliar. (You don’t get to cure people of disease by being afraid of blood on your hands.)</p>
<p>Senku takes the outstretched hand. Gen tangles their fingers together and Senku wants—</p>
<p>“I have to get back to work, Gen.” The mantra, written into his blood, hums to life at the words: <em> Try, try, try, whatever it takes, just keep trying. </em></p>
<p>
  <em> I’ll make it okay, I just have to keep trying. </em>
</p>
<p>That half-delirious, dreamy quality soaks back into Gen’s voice. “Ah, dear Senku is so cruel...He would leave me all alone here in the middle of the night. Where are you going, my dear?” </p>
<p>Senku still doesn’t understand. He pulls his hand away and the conversation splinters with the motion.</p>
<p>“Going to the lab, you idiot mentalist. There’s work to do.”</p>
<p>“Take me with—” Gen gags, leans forward to vomit a full white chrysanthemum, blood-speckled and blooming, over the side of the bed. </p>
<p>Senku picks it up. He’ll keep this one too, since no one’s asked him yet what he needs all these samples for.</p>
<p>Gen wipes his mouth with a sharp motion and doesn’t ask. He grins a hungry grin at Senku in the dark. “Well. I suppose you can’t. Good luck.”</p><hr/>
<p>There are dark circles under Senku’s eyes.</p>
<p>This is the first thing Chrome sees when he shambles into the lab at the crack of dawn. The second thing he sees is the pile of chopped wood on the floor. “What the hell happened here?” he asks, crouching to peer at Senku’s face. “Are you okay, Senku?”</p>
<p>Senku sits on the ground, head bowed in the center of an explosion of tools. “Bedframe,” he explains, brow furrowed as he hammers haphazardly at something.</p>
<p>“A bed...in the lab?”</p>
<p>“For Gen. So I can keep an eye on him. Hand me that saw.”</p>
<p>Chrome does, too bleary to ask further questions.</p>
<p>After a moment, something occurs to him: “Kaseki could probably do it better.”</p>
<p>Senku nods. “And faster. Where is he? I have—” he casts a glance over his shoulder “—solutions that need to be removed from heat.” He’s on his feet, the saw forgotten as he pours a beaker of something boiling into a pot. He nearly spills some, and the way his hands shake is enough to wake Chrome up the rest of the way.</p>
<p>“We can take turns, y’know,” Chrome says, deliberately casual. He reaches for the shelf where he left the materials for his part of the medicine synthesis yesterday.</p>
<p>“Huh? What are you talking about?”</p>
<p>Chrome sets to work. “You don’t have to be the one always pulling all-nighters. We can take turns doing this. I know there’s a lot you can handle, but you’ve told me yourself you need to sleep <em> some </em>times.”</p>
<p>Senku opens his mouth to argue, then shuts it again with a frown.</p>
<p>“It’s perfectly logical, don’t try to deny it,” Chrome says, his mouth curving into a grin.</p>
<p>Senku looks bewildered by that in a way that’s kind of heart-breaking. Then he sets the beaker down clumsily and squeezes his eyes shut for a moment and the expression registers not as confused but <em> exhausted</em>.</p>
<p>Before Chrome can do anything about that, Senku shakes his head roughly. “You’re younger than me. You need the sleep more.”</p>
<p>For a split second, Chrome is stunned into silence. “Seriously? If it wasn’t obvious you haven’t been getting enough rest before, it sure is <em> now</em>,” he snaps. “Sleep isn’t a finite resource, dumbass! All this talk of being rational and scientifically-minded, and you forget that you’re barely older than me. I’m not your kid and you clearly can’t function like this, so go sleep!” Chrome crosses his arms, glaring fiercely. </p>
<p>Senku sighs, looks away as if searching for another argument. </p>
<p>“Get your idiot butt to a bed and <em> trust me</em>, okay?” Chrome says. “This teamwork stuff has to go both ways or else there’s no point.” Whether Senku hears an echo of his own words there is impossible to know.</p>
<p>Regardless, Senku pushes the beaker he set down in Chrome’s direction, a quiet surrender.</p>
<p>“You’ve learned well. You’ll need that,” he mutters. A small spark returns to his eyes. “Shouldn’t have taught you to swear. Especially if <em> dumbass </em> is the best you can do.”</p>
<p>“Do you want a hug or something?” Chrome asks, dropping his arms. He’s pretty sure he isn’t imagining the shakiness tucked beneath Senku’s joking.</p>
<p>Senku squints at him. “What?”</p>
<p>“Nothing, never mind.” Chrome clears his throat, relaxes a little. Senku sounds more like himself now, more alive, more <em> there</em>. (Chrome’s starting to get what Kohaku means, about people being somehow less.) “C’mon, go, I’ll take care of this for today.”</p>
<p>“I don’t really like hugs,” Senku says, still frozen where he stands. </p>
<p>“What does that have to do with anything?” Chrome asks. “Do you always make this little sense when you’re tired?”</p>
<p>“You haven’t seen the least of it.” Senku shakes his head ruefully, eyes narrowed in that way that passes for unspeakable gratitude with him. “I guess you are right though. The world must be ending; Chrome is being more rational than me.”</p>
<p>“Hey!”</p>
<p>At Chrome’s indignant expression, Senku laughs, quiet and wretched, for the first time in days. </p>
<p>Something loosens warmly in Chrome’s chest.</p>
<p>Later, once Chrome explains it to him, Kaseki makes the bedframe easily over the course of an afternoon, and puts together the mattress and bedding too. Chrome makes sure the old man gets a high-five and a smile and the best ramen he knows how to cook.</p>
<p>“Look after those two, Chrome,” Kaseki tells him, taking the steaming bowl and nodding in the direction of the newly-crafted bed. “I can’t help worrying about them. They seemed very close, and hanahaki, of all things…” He trails off with a mournful frown. </p>
<p>Chrome offers his brightest grin. “Don’t worry, I will! We look out for each other—that’s just how the Kingdom of Science works. Things’ll be back to normal in no time, you’ll see.”</p>
<p>“Well, if you say so. But hurry it up,” Kaseki says, affectionately grouchy. “This project was far too easy. Come find me when you have a real challenge on your hands.” </p>
<p>“Sure thing,” Chrome says distractedly, his mind already kicking back into science-mode. (What can he try next? How long is Gen going to last? How long do they have before it’s too late for him?)</p>
<p>Kaseki falters, softens when Chrome looks his way again. “Of course, if you need me to do something like this again, I’ll be here.”</p>
<p>Kaseki leaves, and Chrome goes back to work alone.</p>
<p>The next time Chrome glances out the doorway of the lab, he sees Senku helping Gen stumble his way over to the new bed. Their eyes meet, and something in Senku’s gaze flickers, bright as dying embers.</p><hr/>
<p>Out in the forest one day, Kohaku finds Senku perched on a branch high up in the canopy, silhouetted by sunlight through tree leaves.</p>
<p>“There you are,” she shouts up at him. “What in the gods’ names are you doing up there?”</p>
<p>He peers down at her and waves. Even from this far apart, she can tell he’s doing that funny thing with his eyes that is as close to a smile as he ever gets these days. She doesn’t know how to feel about that. She’s not mad at him, not exactly, not <em> really</em>, and it’s so much harder to be when he looks at her like that, but... </p>
<p>She scales the tree.</p>
<p>“What are you doing here?” he asks.</p>
<p>“I asked first,” Kohaku shoots back.</p>
<p>Senku shrugs, and the motion turns into a wince when Kohaku sits too quickly and their shared branch rocks up and down.</p>
<p>“It’s safe,” she says automatically, patting the bark. It’s sturdy and rough under her hands, and she knows it with a certainty that she can never seem to translate into speech. (She’s nearly broken bones to learn these things, after all.)</p>
<p>“Should’ve known you’d be the first to find me,” Senku mutters.</p>
<p>“It’s not like you were trying very hard to stay hidden. Don’t you have your work to do?”</p>
<p>“I was trying, actually,” he says, looking away like it pains him to admit. Kohaku almost laughs. Almost.</p>
<p>“If you didn’t want to be seen, you should’ve been more careful. Are you <em> hiding </em> here?”</p>
<p>“Taking a break,” he says quickly, raising his hands in a gesture of surrender. (Kohaku breathes out, remembers to let her shoulders relax.) “The reaction I was doing takes a while.”</p>
<p>“How long?”</p>
<p>“Three hundred and twenty-six seconds left to go.”</p>
<p>“Of course you were counting.” She makes a face at him, and he huffs, an argument’s worth of thought communicated in two gestures. She skips to the important part. “But why today?”</p>
<p>The hum of insects in the stifling air is louder than it should be. Senku plucks a leaf from the tree, turns it over in his hands as he makes a querying noise at her.</p>
<p>“You never leave the lab unless someone drags you out kicking and screaming. Did something happen?” She holds her hand out for the leaf. <em> Give me something. </em></p>
<p>He hands it to her without question, sticks his finger in his ear. “Nothing worth worrying about. Science stuff. I’ll take care of it.” He leans forward, swinging his legs a little, until it looks like he’s going to slip right off their branch and go plummeting into the shadowy leaf litter and foliage below. </p>
<p>(Kohaku tries not to get mad for not knowing what she wants from him. It’s not his fault. None of it is, but that doesn’t stop the blood on those grinning teeth, doesn’t stop how gods-damned <em> scared </em> she gets some nights.)</p>
<p>“Did Chrome kick you out or something?” He makes a too-sudden movement and she grabs his arm and yanks hard enough to make him yelp. “Either hold still or let’s go down. If you fall off and get hurt—”</p>
<p>“I know,” he says. He peers at the ground beneath them. “Don’t pull, I can climb down myself.”</p>
<p>They climb down. </p>
<p>On the ground, a fluttering noise in the nearby branches draws her attention away briefly, and when she looks back at Senku, he’s murmuring to himself, “Fifty-seven seconds left.” Then his gaze darts to her and he says, “How do I talk to him about this?”</p>
<p>“What? Who?” Unfortunately, she knows exactly who, and the way Senku’s mouth twists confirms it. “You think I know?” Kohaku asks, more biting than she means it to be. (She can’t shake the memory of gentle, trembling fingers combing through her hair. <em> Plant some nightshade on my grave for me</em>.)</p>
<p>“You’ve been spending a lot of time with him lately.” A rueful smile that makes him look younger and older at the same time. “You probably know him better than I do at this point.” </p>
<p>His eyes have gone somber and there is nothing accusatory about it, but the words, “What else am I <em> supposed </em> to do?” blaze out of Kohaku’s mouth before she realizes it.</p>
<p>Senku looks nearly apologetic.</p>
<p>Kohaku turns away, remembers long blonde hair and bloodstained hands and terror lancing through her as she silently begged every god she knew for her sister’s life. She almost snarls.</p>
<p>But: the bed in the lab. The tired eyes and shaking hands and the starlit nights that always end with white-and-black hair carefully brushed out of a sleeping face.</p>
<p>More careful, Kohaku says, “I guess anyone in the village would know better than you, given that you have about the same emotional range as a small rock.”</p>
<p>Senku’s expression softens into amusement, and Kohaku’s no comedian but she can see the appeal, sometimes. </p>
<p>“What does that have to do with it? Are large rocks known for greater emotional intelligence around here?”</p>
<p>“Not that I know of.” The leaf, she recalls belatedly, is still in her hand. She lets it flutter to the ground, green-veined and bent.</p>
<p>“Could I be a big rock, then?” Senku muses. “Or maybe a piece of corundum would be more interesting. Tungsten? What would it be like to have a melting point of 3400 degrees Celsius, I wonder?”</p>
<p>“Want your outsides to match your insides, rock-for-brains?” Kohaku grumbles, and Senku snorts. (His smiles come easier when he’s away from Gen, and that still makes her prickle all over, but it’s Senku. Despite everything, she’s well past the point of distrusting this cat-grinned boy.) She lets her voice go back to business-like. “He’s making you uncomfortable.”</p>
<p>Senku shakes his head. “Not him, alone. Less him and more… the way he <em> looks </em> at me, like he’s expecting something better than what I have and he thinks I’m going to give it. I don’t—” Senku makes a frustrated noise, scrubs a hand over his face.</p>
<p>“Senku.”</p>
<p>“Yes?”</p>
<p>“He fell in love with <em> you </em>—” Senku grimaces “—however unbelievable that is, so just be you. Just….talk. Talk to him as yourself. The worst that happens is that he realizes you’re a rude, overly-blunt jackass and falls out of love with you on the spot.”</p>
<p>“Limerence tends to make you blind to the other person’s flaws—” Kohaku gives him a sharp glare “—but yes, okay, I see your point. I’ll talk to him. Soon.” There appears to be something very interesting happening with the ground by his feet.</p>
<p>All the things she could say crowd into the silence between them.</p>
<p>
  <em> Gods help me. </em>
</p>
<p>“He’s asleep right now,” she offers. (Kohaku grew up with the wild undergrowth and rough-edged mountainsides. She knows a thing or two about small mercies.)</p>
<p>Senku blinks. “Right. I’ll wait until he wakes up.” His eyes flick to her, turning the statement into a silent question.</p>
<p>“Yes. Talk to him. I don’t think he’s going to start anything on his own.” She pauses, takes in his hunched shoulders and weary face and understands the allure of cupping millennia of knowledge between your hands. “I didn’t think you would be so eager to either.”</p>
<p>Senku shrugs, turning his back on her to rest his head against the tree trunk. (For some animals, allowing another to stand in one’s blind spots is about trust. In others, hiding the soft underbelly is a matter of self-defence.) “I don’t have a choice.” </p>
<p>Another small mercy: “There’s this game Chrome and I play sometimes.”</p>
<p>Senku looks up, bemused.</p>
<p>“I listen for a bird, and try to guess what kind it is based on sound. Chrome’s got a better memory for that kind of thing, so to make it fair, he has to look for them to identify them. We set a time limit and try to pinpoint as many different birds as we can. Whoever locates the most is the winner.”</p>
<p>Senku considers this. “What if you count the same bird twice? Somehow I doubt they all conveniently froze in place for the duration of your game.”</p>
<p>“Whatever. We came up with it as kids. Do you want to play or not? You can go first.”</p>
<p>Senku’s eyes dart to the lab.</p>
<p>“Chrome’s working on his part and I <em> know </em> you have nothing better to do than wait.”</p>
<p>“You seem pretty sure about that.”</p>
<p>“I am.” When he still doesn’t make a move, she says, “Five minutes. You’re the one that was out here in the first place.”</p>
<p>He sticks his tongue out at her.</p>
<p>“Chrome’s been rubbing off on you,” Kohaku observes, almost smiling.</p>
<p>“What? No.”</p>
<p><em> Did Gen teach you how to lie like that? </em> she nearly asks.</p>
<p>Senku does not notice her hesitation. He tilts his chin up, eyes scanning the trees. “<em>Delichon dasypus</em>.”</p>
<p>“Oh come <em> on</em>.” Kohaku glowers at Senku’s clueless expression. “Okay, I don’t think we call our birds by the same names.”</p>
<p>“Asian house martin?” he prompts, curious.</p>
<p>Kohaku shakes her head. “Never heard that one before. We have the word <em> martin</em>, but that’s about it.”</p>
<p>Senku hums thoughtfully and points into the treetops. “What do you call that one?”</p>
<p>By the time she turns, the bird has already flown away in a frantic flutter of wings.</p>
<p>“Ah, well. You said five minutes, right?” Senku asks. “Wanna try again?” </p><hr/>
<p>Gen wakes up to pain in his lungs, pain like blooming vines across his whole chest. He breathes slowly, opens his eyes slowly, watches the ceiling of the lab reveal itself to him in slow, slow blinks. The tinkling of glass sounds from somewhere across the room.</p>
<p>“You awake, Gen?” That’s Chrome’s voice. Odd, it’s usually Senku that notices he’s awake first; has he gone somewhere—?</p>
<p>Chrome’s head appears in Gen’s field of view. “Hey! Want some water?”</p>
<p>“Yes, please.” Chrome has the good sense to let him sit up on his own. Senku would have watched him out of the corner of his eye, and the attention would have made Gen’s blood hum until he did something stupid, but Chrome just bounces away, putting out a fire under one of the beakers before he goes.</p>
<p>The act of getting up is labourious. Every breath misses being enough by a mile. When he sits up all the way, the tickling in his throat gets bad enough that he has to cough until there’s an entire primrose, yellow petals bloodied, in his hands.</p>
<p><em> Desperate</em>. His knowledge of floriography is steadily becoming more of a curse than a blessing. Gen sighs into his hands and it almost turns into hysterical laughter. Reduced to this, for this wonderful, stupid, <em> brilliant </em> leek-haired boy.</p>
<p>Luckily, Chrome returns soon with that promised cup of water. “How do you feel?” Chrome asks, handing over the cup and canting his head to one side like a solemn puppy.</p>
<p>Gen smiles and pats Chrome on the head, twice. “Wonderful, thanks to you.”</p>
<p>“Ah, don’t be like that,” Chrome mutters, sitting on the edge of the bed.</p>
<p>“Aw,” Gen coos. “Are you blushing, my dear?”</p>
<p>Chrome ducks his head in a way that he must have picked up from Senku. The ache in Gen’s chest flares at the resemblance and he coughs up enough petals to make Chrome pull a face. </p>
<p>“You’re scared too, aren’t you?” </p>
<p>Gen, recovering, takes a slow sip of water, hums a question.</p>
<p>“You only talk all sweet like that when scary stuff is happening. When you think you’re in danger,” Chrome says, eyes resolutely focused on the floor.</p>
<p>“What happened to you being emperor of obliviousness, dear Chrome?” Gen sighs into the cup.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, Chrome will not be deterred. “I’m way smarter than you guys give me credit for. Admit it, I’m right,” he insists, crossing his arms and kicking his legs out.</p>
<p>“I could swear Suika is less of a child than you are,” Gen replies. Chrome sticks his tongue out at him good-naturedly. “Let’s say you’re right. Let’s imagine that what you’re saying is true. So? What of it? I don’t know how to use a katana half as well as our Kohaku, nor do I have the scientific knowledge you and Senku have. One attracts more flies with honey than vinegar, and I am a <em> very </em> good fly-catcher.” Gen smiles his most fetching smile. “I have to be a liar to survive out here, you know.”</p>
<p>“No you don’t!” Chrome shouts, shooting to his feet with startling abruptness. “Not here. Not with us! We’re your <em> friends</em>, Gen.”</p>
<p>Gen tilts his head to one side, pretends to be listening. Perhaps his words didn’t come out as sing-song as he’d intended.</p>
<p>“The Kingdom of Science, all of us, we’re on your side!” Chrome makes a sweeping gesture. Gen leans back a bit in his spot on the bed, and Chrome adjusts unconsciously, calming down. “You can be honest with us, I swear.” </p>
<p>“I’m being perfectly honest, Chrome dear.”</p>
<p>Chrome scowls. “You don’t sound like it.”</p>
<p>Gen laughs, fights back another coughing fit. “Will you be so kind as to teach me then? What should honesty sound like, dear?”</p>
<p>“I’ll show you honesty.” Chrome jabs a thumb at himself, eyes shining. “Me and Senku and everyone else, you gotta know we’d risk our lives a billion times over for you!”</p>
<p>Well.</p>
<p>Gen stares down into his water. All this truthfulness is making him light-headed. “Sit down, Chrome. I don’t doubt that for a moment, but I’m tired, and I can hardly sleep while you’re hopping around all agitated like that.” </p>
<p>Chrome obeys immediately, returning to his spot on the edge of the bed. He looks worried, brow furrowed, which only makes Gen giggle, a little delirious and maybe closer to crying than he’d like. These fucking flowers. His chest hurts and he wants to curl in on himself like a wounded animal.</p>
<p>“You know, Chrome,” Gen starts, letting the honey filter out of his voice, “you don’t reform a liar just by yelling for a bit about friendship. This isn’t an anime, after all.”</p>
<p>“My point still stands! We <em> care </em> about you, and it’s okay if you’re scared because I—” He runs a hand through his hair. Shuts his eyes like he’s bracing himself for a blow. “We’re scared too.”</p>
<p>“I know.” Gen sets the cup down, reaches out to tug twice on Chrome’s arm. Chrome goes along with it obligingly, shifting closer. “I’ll keep what you said in mind.” He pulls Chrome into a hug to communicate all the other words lodged like petals in his throat.</p>
<p>“You better,” Chrome mutters, squeezing tightly back. “You gotta talk to him.”</p>
<p>“I know. I know.”</p>
<p>“Okay,” Chrome mutters, voice cracking. “<em>Good</em>.”</p>
<p>“...Don’t cry on me, dear. You'll get snot on my clothes.”</p>
<p>“Screw you, I can’t—” Chrome sniffles, burying his face in Gen’s neck. “Just shut up, you bastard. It’s like you and Senku are allergic to feelings.”</p>
<p>“Who’s to say we aren’t, my dear Chrome? It’s probably fatal.”</p>
<p>When Senku returns, Chrome has gotten back to work. Gen’s cup of water is set neatly on the centre table, and Gen himself is tucked under a blanket, fast asleep in a shower of white petals.</p><hr/>
<p>This is how it starts. Kohaku tumbles into the lab just this side of out of breath, clutching a dubious looking bundle of plants in one hand. In the basket on her back, bits of leaves poke out from between the woven gaps. </p>
<p>Gen breaks the silence before Chrome, slumped on the floor and fighting a losing battle against days of sleep deprivation, can muster the energy to say anything. “Hello, dear Kohaku. What did you bring back?”</p>
<p>“Stuff.” Kohaku nudges Chrome with her foot, miming distraction. “Getting up any time soon?”</p>
<p>“No,” Chrome grumbles, moving to lean against the side of Gen’s bed. Gods, he’s tired. The weariness runs bone-deep, all the days spent experimenting and planning and worrying dragging him down like boulders tied to his limbs.</p>
<p>“Geez, what happened to you?” She looks around, shrugging off the basket and carefully setting the bundle in her hand on the lab table. A little quieter, she asks, “Where is Senku?”</p>
<p>“Somewhere,” Chrome groans. He buries his face in his arms. “Didn’t say.”</p>
<p>The soft sound of fabric rustling. Then Kohaku says, “You should’ve asked where he was going.”</p>
<p>“Do <em> you </em> want to go get him to come back?” Chrome grumbles.</p>
<p>There is a silence that speaks for itself.</p>
<p>“Thought so. Anyway, he probably went to the river to get more water.”</p>
<p>In reply, Kohaku gives him a (comparatively) gentle kick in the side. Chrome lifts his head blearily, rubbing at his ribs with the beginnings of a complaint already on his tongue. He is stopped by Gen’s hand on his head.</p>
<p>“I’m sure dear Senku has his reasons for being wherever he is,” Gen says. A hand combs through Chrome’s hair, unfamiliar in its gentleness. Chrome leans into it and Gen smiles.</p>
<p>“You smile more when he’s not around,” Chrome blurts without thinking. He gets a much harder kick in the ribs for that one, and Gen’s hand retreats. </p>
<p>“You think so?” Gen coos, meaningless. The warmth in his eyes vanishes when Kohaku’s fingers hook into the back of Chrome’s shirt and drag Chrome away.</p>
<p>Chrome protests loudly, mostly as a matter of principle, but Kohaku just stares back without releasing him, abruptly unreadable in a way that makes Chrome’s stomach drop. “What’s with you?” he complains on the wrong side of too-loud. Kohaku’s eyes go to Gen, as if on instinct.</p>
<p>“Don’t look like that,” Gen murmurs, the sickly sweetness leaving his voice. “I like you two too.”</p>
<p>“We didn’t doubt <em> that</em>,” Kohaku mutters, finally letting of Chrome. “You guys…”</p>
<p>Chrome lets his mouth move before his half-asleep brain can catch up. “If we could barricade you guys in the same room and make you talk to each other, we would.” He tugs irritably at his shirt to save himself having to look at the other two’s faces.</p>
<p>Silence stretches thin with the tension hovering over their heads.</p>
<p>“Speak for yourself,” Kohaku scoffs eventually, reaching down to straighten Chrome’s right sleeve. “I could lock them in a room together easily. I’d just pick them up and toss them in. They weigh next to nothing.”</p>
<p>At that, Gen laughs, bright and glowing as the noonday sun. Chrome looks up, surprise jolting through him. (When was the last time he heard laughter like that?)</p>
<p>Kohaku grins slowly, like she can’t stop herself, and suddenly the sunlight on Chrome’s back feels perfect. Wordlessly, he gets to his feet, and breathes, and the world keeps moving, as it always has. As it has since it was only a collection of heat and liquid rock, the world keeps circling its lonely star, and everything that happens next happens next.</p>
<p>What happens next is that Chrome hands Gen a cup of water and gets back to work. What happens next is that Kohaku makes herself at home on the end of the bed, close enough to tug gently on Gen’s sleeve and draw him into quiet conversation. What happens next is that Gen’s shoulders relax enough for him to unhide the flowers in his sleeves and show them off, coaxing them into dancing across his palms.</p>
<p>What happens next is that they pretend the world is quiet and gentle and easy. They pretend this one afternoon could go on forever, carried by the rhythms of their conversation and soft laughter. They pretend nothing needs to change, that there is no terror pressing in on them on all sides, that none of them wake in the dead of night drowning in a world too rife with possibility. And as they pretend, the world keeps moving on.</p>
<p>In the end, Chrome sighs, pushes his experiment to one side, and hops onto the lab table to sit and watch Gen’s magic unfold. He <em> ooh </em>s softly at all the right moments, and Gen’s coughs almost sound like chuckles. He’s careful not to crush the unbloodied blossoms in his hands, and something like a smile plays its way across Kohaku’s face.</p>
<p>In the end, they let themselves be almost okay.</p>
<p>In the end, the crushing weight of the world hits them all again when Senku walks in carrying a bucket of water.</p>
<p>This is how it ends. Senku and Gen glance at each other, too fast to hide their apprehension, and Chrome’s heart breaks in the strained silence that follows. It’s like something tangible has wrapped itself around their throats and pulled.</p>
<p>Eventually, Chrome forces himself to turn back to his work, to return to Senku’s side. (More than anything, it scares him that Senku walks right by without scolding him for slacking off.) He’ll want help sorting the materials Kohaku brought back, and if his silence is any indication, it would be a bad idea to let him do it alone. </p>
<p>“Talk to him,” he overhears Kohaku whisper to Gen. She doesn’t get up to leave though. She stays right where she is, one knee bumping against Gen’s leg, as Chrome pushes himself into Senku’s personal space, asking questions that he only sort of has to fake his enthusiasm for.</p>
<p>Senku idly nudges Chrome out of the way with his elbow. He starts talking, quiet but earnest, pointing to the bundle of plants Kohaku left on the table, picking it apart with his words. Neither mention their awareness of Gen’s eyes on them from across the room, how heavy that knowing weighs in their minds. Chrome leans forward, learns eagerly, and hopes that for now, that’s enough.</p>
<p>For now, the spectre of time coils around them, and goes still.</p><hr/>
<p>Senku sits down carefully on the floor by the bed, exhaustion written into the way he props his arms up on the mattress, leans his head to one side. Gen can’t help smiling in greeting.</p>
<p>“This is such an illogical disease,” Senku mutters, brow furrowing. Gen feels his smile widen. How very Senku, to look death in the eye and call it irrational.</p>
<p>Then, to Gen’s endless surprise, Senku <em> keeps </em> talking.</p>
<p>“It doesn’t make any sense. It will progress as long as you <em> think </em> your love isn’t reciprocated romantically, and somehow love from your friends doesn’t cure it. If it’s limerence, there have to be biomarkers specific to that state of being, but romantic love involves so many regions of the brain. How does it <em> do </em> this?” His eyes are so, so bright, and his hands are curled into fists on the blankets, rumpling the fabric.</p>
<p>Senku opens his mouth like he has more to say—he always has more to say, doesn’t he, and so much of it brilliant enough that Gen would happily listen for hours—and then shuts it. Gen wants to put his hands on this wonderful, miraculous creature’s skin, smooth his messy hair back into place, trace his fingers over his cheekbones, tug him closer and closer and closer, but that wanting was what got him into this mess in the first place. </p>
<p>He grants himself the small miracle of putting his hand on top of Senku’s anyway, and imagines he doesn’t see how Senku’s expression shifts.</p>
<p>“The simplest cure is beyond our reach,” he says. “If it had been someone else, there might’ve been a chance—” He shakes his head sharply, and anyone else would have missed the split second of heartbreak that crosses his face. “We can’t do the surgery, and I’m not trained in the type of therapy that can put a stop to this. Even the medicine was pretty trial-and-error in the modern world, and now...This is really the worst-case scenario, isn’t it?”</p>
<p>He reaches out with the hand Gen isn’t holding, carefully brushing Gen’s hair out of his face the way he’s been doing for weeks now. His hands are shaking, but his voice stays even. “Hang in there, mentalist. We’re going to make this medicine no matter what. Just stay alive a little longer.”</p>
<p>Gen doesn’t apologize, and neither does Senku.</p>
<p>“What’s all this about, my dearest?” Gen murmurs. He finds he can’t bring himself to sweeten his tone.</p>
<p>“Proof,” Senku mutters, mouth twisting. </p>
<p>Gen waits.</p>
<p>“All scientific theories need proof. Substantial evidence to corroborate the claim. If you encounter data that disproves your hypothesis, you need to go back to step one and revise it. It’s okay if you’re not right the first time, Gen, it’s fine because all you have to do is change the hypothesis—” Senku’s face crumples. </p>
<p>Senku crying is the exact opposite of Senku teaching. The omnipresent pain in Gen’s chest flares at the sight. Senku’s shoulders come up, draw him in on himself until he looks hopelessly alone, and Gen’s hand on his is not enough. (Was it ever?) A single sharp inhale breaks the silence, and tears trace their way down Senku’s face. He’s shaking again, whispering something into the cool night air.</p>
<p>“I know, dear,” Gen says. The tickle of petals in his throat makes him cough. He swallows hard. “I’m sorry I called you cruel.”</p>
<p>That only makes Senku curl up tighter. He adjusts his grip on Gen’s hand, and Gen nearly lets go, mistaking it for rejection, before Senku grabs tight and squeezes hard enough to bruise. Gen runs his thumb over Senku’s knuckles. Then he curls up too, coughs a few violets onto the sheets. Proof. <em>Quod erat demonstrandum. </em></p>
<p>They stay like that, breathing, aching, for the rest of the night.</p><hr/>
<p>Kohaku knows something has changed the moment she steps into the lab. Senku is tucked in on himself, legs pulled up to his chest, fingers wrapped loosely around the corner of a blanket on Gen’s bed. If it wasn’t Senku, Kohaku would think he looks like a child. If it wasn’t Gen’s bed, she wouldn’t have been so confused.</p>
<p>She glances automatically at Gen, and he smiles, eyes crinkling. “I don’t think he’s slept more than a few hours at a time in weeks now. Six hours might be a new record for him.” His expression when he looks back down at Senku does something awful and wrenching to Kohaku’s heart, and her hands itch for her daggers as she looks away.</p>
<p>He catches her eye again. “Don’t worry, this monster hasn’t hurt him.”</p>
<p>“Monster?” she grits out. Kohaku’s not the type for crying, but <em> gods</em>, these two are impossible. </p>
<p>“You disagree, darling?”</p>
<p>“You’re not a monster. No one would ever call you that.” </p>
<p><em> No one would ever call you a burden, </em> she used to tell her sister. It’s not fair how familiar the words are on her tongue.</p>
<p>“They would.”</p>
<p>“They’d be <em> wrong</em>.”</p>
<p>“Hm. Not even this one? This little devil, this sleazy little snake?” And despite it all, even Gen’s insults carry a whisper of affection. (A whisper of love. A whisper of guilt. It’s like he’s afraid to be any louder.) His hand hovers near Senku’s hair, not touching. “Not even this creature would recognize one of his own?”</p>
<p>Senku stays asleep.</p>
<p>“Tell him—”</p>
<p>Gen shakes his head like he’s scolding a child. “I’ve already told him everything I can.” His words carry an uncomfortable weight. They sound honest. “It’s different for you, dear, isn’t it? You will always have a weapon in your hand and a shield on your back.”</p>
<p>They’ve had this conversation before. “Lot of good a spear can do when the things trying to kill you are inside of you.”</p>
<p>“Lot of good pretty words can do when you’ve forgotten how to lie.” Like a sputtering candle, light dances in Gen’s eyes, quietly vicious. His hand comes up, as if to touch her face. “Lot of good a magician can do without his magic.”</p>
<p>“You have us.” But even as she says the words, she’s starting to understand that that hasn’t always been true, not for these two. Senku used to flinch when she moved past him too fast, and for the first week, Gen’s eyes never quite left her hands when she was in his field of view. She thinks of the village and imagines walking through this world without them. It’s a lonely thought, and looking at Gen, it’s one she wants desperately to unmake.</p>
<p>“Chrome said the same thing,” Gen murmurs, softening. “Keep this up and I might start actually believing you.”</p>
<p><em> It’s not fair</em>, Kohaku thinks as she struggles to find the words. It’s not fair how easy it is for Chrome to just <em> say </em> these things to people.</p>
<p>As if summoned, Chrome walks in. He gives the sleeping Senku a complicated sort of look, then shrugs and moves on. (What happened to them while she wasn’t looking?)</p>
<p>It’s not fair.</p>
<p>She sits down in her usual spot at the end of the bed and repeats herself out loud. “It’s not fair.”</p>
<p>Sweet enough to choke on, Gen says, “Nothing is fair, my dear.”</p>
<p>“You don’t believe that,” she informs him primly. “It’s not fair, any of it, for any of us, and you know it.” Before Gen can say anything more in that sugar-coated tone, she says, “It’s not fair that this is killing both of you when neither of you want this, it’s not fair that Chrome and I have been doing this since we were kids and we’re <em> still </em> doing this, it’s not—” Kohaku stops, breath hitching. Her voice sounds so childish even to her own ears. She looks up and Chrome is watching her, worried. </p>
<p>Senku mumbles something in his sleep, fingers hooking into the edge of Gen’s robes, unguarded in his rest in a way he never is awake, and she suddenly needs Gen to believe her more than anything in the world. “Gen. I know nothing’s fair. I know. And I know you know. But that doesn’t mean we’re going to stop. We’re not going anywhere. We’re not…”</p>
<p>Chrome was always better at these things. Kohaku puts her hand on Senku’s ankle, just to make sure he’s still there. She thinks she’s imagining it when his body relaxes minutely.</p>
<p>“The odds are stacked against us, but we’re staying here. Your secrets will be safe with us.” They’re not the perfect words, because Chrome being better than her with words doesn’t mean much, but it is a promise. It’s a promise she and Chrome would be willing to etch into their bones.</p>
<p>“It’s not fair how good you guys are at inspirational speeches,” someone’s voice says, rusty with sleep.</p>
<p>Kohaku jerks back like she was physically shocked by that electricity Senku likes so much. Senku is staring at her with half-lidded eyes. Gen grins at her, showing off teeth, and while Kohaku very much feels like she just had a trick pulled on her, the sight of that smile quiets her.</p>
<p>Senku sits up a bit too fast, exchanges an unreadable look with Gen. Kohaku might not know exactly what happened, but he doesn’t seem so eager anymore to duck out of Gen’s sight, and that’s…better than she was expecting. </p>
<p>It doesn’t take long for Senku to remember himself after that and make his excuses to retreat to the other side of the lab. They don’t get half so close to each other again for the rest of the day, but Kohaku knows she doesn’t imagine how neither is quite so tense being in the same room anymore.</p>
<p>Much later, when she hands Gen a cup of water, he blinks slowly at it, then at her, and says without so much as a hint of song, “I think I believe you.” He breathes out, almost shuddering, as if it’s breaking him open to admit. “At any rate, I think it’d be nice to try.” </p>
<p>Even later than that, as Kohaku makes her way out of the lab, she notices that Senku is watching her go, his smile is so barely-there and soft she knows it’s meant entirely for her. At last, something like hope carries her out into the afternoon air.</p><hr/>
<p>Chrome returns from his supply hunt as the sun’s going down, and finds Senku and Kohaku huddled under a tree, muttering frantically. Kohaku’s hair is elaborately done up, and Senku is gesturing emphatically at the dirt as he talks.</p>
<p>“Guys? What’s going on?”</p>
<p>Senku looks up and<em> grins</em>, toothy and genuine. “I double-checked, and Gen hasn’t coughed up a flower in days. It’s been two weeks since there was any blood, and you saw how bad it was before.”</p>
<p>Chrome nearly drops everything he’s holding right then and there. “Does that mean…?”</p>
<p>“We shouldn’t get our hopes up too soon,” Kohaku says, eyes bright. Ever pragmatic.</p>
<p>“She’s right. This might be the hanahaki wearing off on its own, or from some outside influence we’re not aware of yet, but we shouldn’t let our guards down.” </p>
<p>“Has this happened before? Hanahaki going away on its own?” Chrome asks.</p>
<p>Senku shrugs. “I don’t know. Like I said, it wasn’t that well researched.” He turns to gaze pensively at the lab. “He <em> seems </em> to be doing better. We’ll keep working on that medicine, but I think we can start taking it slower.”</p>
<p>“Thank the gods,” Chrome mumbles, slumping to the ground. He feels exhaustion tugging at every bone in him. He could probably fall asleep right here.</p>
<p>Senku crouches down and pokes him, unimpressed. “This might not be what we think. We have to keep working hard. It was your turn to sleep yesterday—did you not get enough rest?”</p>
<p>“You can’t tell me you’re not tired too! No way!” Chrome flails his hand out until he hits skin, but from the sharply offended noise and the dagger-tip that’s suddenly hovering over him, he missed his target.</p>
<p>“Sorry!” he yelps, unable to move with the point so close to his face.</p>
<p>Senku, still in Chrome’s field of view, snickers, but he also narrows his eyes, softening. “It will be nice to sleep for consecutive nights for once.”</p>
<p>The knife retreats. “Both of you look like you need the rest. Badly.”</p>
<p>“Exactly!” Chrome juts his chin out, triumphant, but the odd angle he’s lying at means he just winds up smushing the side of his head into the dirt when he moves.</p>
<p>Senku helps him sit up, lopsided smile widening as Chrome tries to brush a twig out of his hair. “You look happy, but I don’t think that was supposed to be a compliment.”</p>
<p>“It wasn’t. I’m sleepy just watching you guys.” Kohaku settles next to Chrome, and presses their shoulders together. She brushes a dried leaf off his shirt. Nodding at Senku, she says, “I’ll keep an eye on Gen. Wake you up if it starts getting bad again.”</p>
<p>Senku sits cross-legged near them. “Thanks.” He nudges Chrome, who’s already drooping in place, eyes sliding shut. “Don’t pass out here. There’s a perfectly good bedroll in the hut.”</p>
<p>“I’ll think about it,” Chrome promises around a yawn, not thinking about it at all.</p>
<p>“He’s not going to think about it,” Kohaku says flatly. </p>
<p>“No, he isn’t, is he?” Senku sounds amused, relaxed in a way he hasn’t been in a long while.</p>
<p>Kohaku elbows Chrome when he tries to put his head on her shoulder. “Go sleep inside,” she mutters to him.</p>
<p>“Ugh, fine.” Chrome stretches out, grins as an idea dawns on him. He grabs Senku by the hand and yanks him to his feet. “But you’re coming with me.” </p>
<p>And Senku complains about being ‘kidnapped’ the whole way there, but he doesn’t fight it, and if they happen to fall asleep under the same blanket, Chrome with one arm sprawled over Senku’s chest and Senku murmuring softly about interesting constellations until he’s yawning more than speaking, well. They’ve been working their butts off. They can be forgiven a few eccentricities.</p><hr/>
<p>Senku and Gen come to a silent, tentative agreement. Steadily, they learn. </p>
<p>At the end of the day, Senku cleans up the lab tables and waves good night to Chrome, promising to return to the science hut soon.</p>
<p>“Don’t fall asleep on the floor again, you hear?” Chrome calls as he’s leaving. “It’s bad for your back!”</p>
<p>“Yeah, yeah, don’t go confusing me with Old Man Kaseki. My back’s perfectly fine,” Senku replies. He gives himself three seconds to watch Chrome go, then turns to Gen with a sigh. </p>
<p>“You remember when you asked me about the ‘game over’ thing?” </p>
<p>Gen smiles lazily, makes it look sleepy and effortless. Still his words drip out like sugared water, like the soda he loves so much. “How could I forget anything you say, Senku dear?”</p>
<p>Senku settles at the foot of the bed, as far from Gen’s searching eyes as he can reasonably get without ending the conversation. There is something fragile here he needs to study further. </p>
<p>“Making it a game makes it less—It makes it easier.” Science does not stand for such vagueness. Luckily, he’s sitting down and, less luckily, science doesn’t hold very much sway here. It feels like he’s wrenching the words out of himself. “Might as well have fun while we’re here.”</p>
<p>Gen doesn’t try to move closer. A few petals litter the sheets around him. “I see,” he says. </p>
<p>Senku shudders at the knowledge that he does. To Gen, he is glass all the way through. <em> Centrolenidae</em>, order Anura, guts and heart on full display. Laid out on the operating table and stupid enough to give a magician the scalpel. </p>
<p>“Your turn,” Senku says, picking the petals up one by one and watching them flutter into the basket on the floor.</p>
<p>“What do you mean?”</p>
<p>“It’s your turn to say something. I have a hypothesis,” Senku explains, and it becomes true in his saying of it. “Talk.”</p>
<p>“About what, my dearest Senku?” </p>
<p>Senku would probably throw up if he had eat something half as sweet as Gen’s voice right now.</p>
<p>“No one’s listening, mentalist. Just talk. This isn’t a performance. You don’t perform anymore, remember? Tell me...tell me something I don’t know about you.”</p>
<p>“There’s a lot,” Gen purrs, his gaze flitting away to somewhere over Senku’s shoulder. “Where would you like me to start?”</p>
<p>“Anywhere. Pick one thing. One fact.”</p>
<p>Some of the sweetness drains away as Gen hums in thought. He coughs once. “Back in the modern world, I liked knitting.”</p>
<p>Senku narrowly avoids snorting in disbelief. It probably shows on his face though, since Gen’s next words are, “Let me finish, sweetheart.”</p>
<p>Senku refocuses on the petals.</p>
<p>“I liked knitting, and I would have happily knit you all scarves and hats and mittens and whatever else you might want.” Gen takes a breath. “It feels good, doesn’t it?” Sparrow-feather voice, soft but not sweet. “To make something with your own hands?”</p>
<p>All petals. Fewer than before. No flowers. No blood. Senku smiles. </p>
<p>“Yeah.” </p>
<p>He dares to meet Gen’s eyes, expecting to flinch at the stranger he finds, and instead discovers that it’s Gen. It’s just Gen. </p>
<p>“I can make you some knitting needles, if you want them,” Senku offers, bolder.</p>
<p>A spark in Gen’s eyes. “You’ll make them, or you’ll get Kaseki to make them for you and take all the credit?”</p>
<p>Senku shuts his mouth, displeased.</p>
<p>Gen laughs. “I’d like knitting needles, even if you lie to be about who made them. I’d like any gift from you, Senku dear.”</p>
<p>Senku chooses not to think too hard about that second part. “It might take a day or two,” he says. “You can make yarn out of fabric too, right?”</p>
<p>Gen nods, says, “I’ll do that part myself. It will keep me occupied, if nothing else.” He sighs, playfully wistful. “Dying gets really boring sometimes.”</p>
<p>“Idiot,” Senku mutters, laughing under his breath because he doesn’t know what else to do. He can’t ignore the way Gen watches him, as careful, as on edge as Senku is. How long has he been doing that for? “I’ll get you all the fabric you could possibly want,” he promises. “What do you plan to make?”</p>
<p>Gen taps the sheets with a finger, twice. “Tell me your hypothesis first. A trade.”</p>
<p>There’s a flicker of mischief on his face. He’s learning. </p>
<p>“My hypothesis is that Chrome and Kohaku talking to you regularly has something to do with causing the limerence to fade. It’s not a very solid hypothesis, but it’d be good to try, wouldn’t it? Try talking more.”</p>
<p>Gen coughs hard, creating a small flurry. Senku’s lungs constrict in sympathy.</p>
<p>“Easier said than done,” Gen wheezes. </p>
<p>“I can go first,” Senku says. The scalpel again. He thinks he might be handing Gen sharp cutting instruments for the rest of his life. “My dad went through a poetry phase once. He had that poem about the dying astronomer memorized. I made my own ear plugs so I wouldn’t have to listen when he started reciting it for guests.”</p>
<p>“Your pops sounds like an awfully interesting person,” Gen chuckles. </p>
<p>Senku nods and stares down at his hands. Before he can wonder if he made a mistake, Gen changes the subject for him. “There’s so much I could tell you, Senku dear.”</p>
<p>“I know. Pick one.”</p>
<p>“Ah, but there are so many to choose from! You already know everything there is to know about me, darling.” </p>
<p>The fact that they make hesitant eye contact before they dare trade smiles—Gen’s teasing, Senku’s doubtful—ruins the joke somewhat, but Senku grew up with Taiju and Yuzuriha. Alongside biochemistry and astrophysics and computer programming, he learned as a kid how to be forgiving to a fault.</p>
<p>“You still haven’t told me what you’re going to make with those needles. Could start with that.”</p>
<p>Gen hums, tilting his head. It’s an inexplicable flash of reticence, and Senku wants to retreat. The old echo: <em> Who are you? </em></p>
<p>Out loud, he almost says that. “Tell me who you are.”</p>
<p>Gen’s attention shifts to Senku thoughtfully, and there is a weight to his gaze that wasn’t there before. Alertness. Like if Senku gets close enough, he’ll see the shadows of fish darting between rocks. It pings something wonderfully, dizzyingly near to relief.</p>
<p>“...You know, I’m not sure I remember what exactly my parents’ faces look like anymore.”</p>
<p>Senku stops fidgeting with his hands, surprised.</p>
<p>“I didn’t pay much attention when they were right there in front of me. I suppose I always figured they would still be there later. My mind playing tricks on me about how time works. Logically, I knew they’d die some day, but it’s easy to forget, isn’t it?”</p>
<p>Senku doesn’t dare think the name. But he’s had enough courtesy drilled into him to say, “You didn’t have to tell me that.” <em> Thank you. </em></p>
<p>He looks over at Gen, on the opposite side of the bed, afraid he’ll shatter open. </p>
<p>“Your turn now.” Gen smiles, a small, careful attempt, and the fragile thing hanging in the space between them bursts open and blooms. For once, the blooming makes breathing easier for the both of them.</p><hr/>
<p>Gen figures an important talk is well overdue by the time the flowers tumbling out of his mouth become a distant dream.</p>
<p>“This doesn’t have to be transactional,” Gen tells Senku one day, flat and toneless. They’re sitting close enough that Gen could reach out and take his hand. He doesn’t, content to be aware of the way the mattress dips to accommodate a second weight.</p>
<p>“Make it a game. Makes it easier.”</p>
<p>“Senku. Will you give me your hand?” Adds a tinge of something crooning, something sweet. Senku frowns at him, but stretches out his arm, palm up.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry.” Gen starts massaging Senku’s hand.</p>
<p>Senku’s fingers twitch in his grasp.</p>
<p>“For?”</p>
<p>Gen takes as deep a breath as he can. “It’d take a real idiot not to see how uncomfortable I was making you. I owe you an apology—”</p>
<p>“Who the fuck are you and what have you done with Gen.” Senku’s gone tense, shoulders hunched. Still he leaves his hand open, palm up, and Gen doesn’t stop kneading at the wiry muscle and flesh.</p>
<p>“Let me give you one honest apology, won’t you, Senku dearest?”</p>
<p>“That sounds more like it.” Senku scowls at Gen, and then at the floor. “You’re so good at impersonating people; how’d you get so bad at sounding like yourself?” </p>
<p>They let the silence linger, this side of festering, for almost too long.</p>
<p>Gen tries again because there’s nothing else he can do.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry. I need you to know that. You weren’t okay with my advances from the very beginning. I was making you uncomfortable and I failed to respect your boundaries. I’ll be more careful about that now, but I should have respected them the moment I noticed. It shouldn’t have taken me this long.”</p>
<p>Still the stiff line of his shoulders, still the hand like an unfurled blossom on Gen’s hand. Senku sighs as Gen pushes his thumb into the meat of Senku’s palm.</p>
<p>“You…” Senku scrunches his nose (Gen’s heart still does acrobatics at the sight), starts again. “Feelings like that screw with your head. Make a person irrational and obsessive. Serotonin depletion in extreme cases. Conducive to the eventual formation of long term romantic relationships, sometimes, but also painful and scary when the other person doesn’t...feel the same way. Less intense and it wouldn’t have been a problem to begin with. I know all that. Just didn’t realize what it’d actually be like in practice.” He scoots a little closer, the tension seeping out of him with every press of Gen’s hands. “People get weird when they’re dying.”</p>
<p>“You’re right, but that’s not an excuse.”</p>
<p>“I guess not. I’m sorry too, for not talking to you sooner. Or for not explaining better. Or...” He huffs a laugh, presses his free hand to his forehead. “Kohaku <em> told </em> me to, and I...couldn’t look you in the eye. I didn’t know how to say anything to you anymore.” Gen pretends not to notice Senku’s gaze on him. “It was <em> weird</em>.”</p>
<p>“Yeah. It was.” Breathing comes easier and easier now. “It was <em> so </em> weird,” he says, almost laughing.</p>
<p>It feels like a relief to admit these things.</p>
<p>There is a comfortable stretch of silence. Gen slows his movements. Senku, eyes half-lidded, makes no attempt to pull his hand away.</p>
<p>Then, because he has to say the dangerous bits too, Gen says, “I meant it though. The hanahaki… The feelings that caused it were real. I think there were parts of it that were weird for you that felt right to me.”</p>
<p>“I figured as much,” Senku murmurs, visibly curling in on himself. Still his hand stays open, relaxed enough that Gen sees no reason to comment on it. “That was part of it too. That I was probably the one being strange. Statistically, there are way more non-aromantic people than there are aromantic people, so really it’s the <em> not </em> being in love that makes someone the odd one out.”</p>
<p>“You were strange, but so was I, dear.” </p>
<p>Senku stills like a lake freezing over, eyes narrowing. </p>
<p>Gen grows serious, makes sure Senku sees it. “I want to be clear.” Takes a breath and forges past the way his stomach churns. “The feelings were and still are real. They’re...less intense now, I think, and I shouldn’t have pushed it on you the way I did, but I don’t control them.”</p>
<p>Senku blinks slow and careful. “You would’ve died,” he rasps. “If you had said something any later, you’d have died. What else could you have done?” </p>
<p>Gen softens his tone. “I could have told you and then stopped. You didn’t imagine it; I did flirt with you.” He wants to hide, to curl away from this, but Senku’s hand is still in his lap, and Gen thinks maybe they owe each other this. Guts and heart, dripping viscera in each other’s hands. “Or I could have kept quiet and saved you the hurt.”</p>
<p>“If I did something to make you think I would rather have you <em> dead </em>, I think—” Senku breaks off with a huff, face turning pink. “It wasn’t comfortable, but… You think that little of me, mentalist? That I’d just let you die because I’m romance-repulsed?”</p>
<p>His tone veers close to blithe, but it’s Senku, which means the aching pain under the words has probably been simmering there for months unspoken. </p>
<p>“I wondered.”</p>
<p>“I’m sorry for making you wonder.” It doesn’t take Gen’s particular skillset to see how completely he means it. Then he adds, “Okay, my turn.” </p>
<p>Gen shakes his head. “No more turns. I don’t think I could ever do enough to repay everything I owe you.”</p>
<p>“Not true.” Then, quieter: “I could say the same to you.”</p>
<p>Gen waits.</p>
<p>“In the interest of clarity,” Senku starts. “I don’t hold your feelings against you. I felt weird talking to you because suddenly everything had the possibility of romance behind it, and I hated that. I couldn’t wrap my head around it at all. You were my friend, and I didn’t even really need to think about that for it to make sense, and then suddenly, it was like I couldn’t recognize you anymore. I couldn't understand this whole other new part of you and it... It’s hard to describe what it felt like.”</p>
<p>Gen traces a pattern on the back of Senku’s hand, the best kind of apology he can manage right now, then resumes massaging. Senku sighs.</p>
<p>“I’m curious. Have you never had to deal with these things before?” Gen asks neutrally.</p>
<p>“A few classmates. Before. None of <em> them </em> got hanahaki,” he says with mostly feigned annoyance. “Usually I’d just ignore it until it went away.” </p>
<p>“Which you couldn’t do with me.”</p>
<p>“Like you said, I technically could have.” </p>
<p>The corner of Gen’s mouth ticks up before he even sees Senku’s barely-there smile. </p>
<p>“Unfortunately, I do like you. I didn’t know how to keep being your friend without…” Senku waves vaguely at everything, looking pained.</p>
<p>Gen taps on Senku’s palm, twice. “I like you too. In the friend way, I mean.”</p>
<p>“A lot has happened, mentalist. Can we…” Senku hesitates. In that moment, it’s like seeing Senku for the first time. Senku clears his throat, ducks his head. “Can we keep being friends?”</p>
<p>He sounds small, uncertain. It’s so unlike Senku that Gen nearly laughs, half-convinced this is a trick. But if there’s anything Gen knows, it’s what someone looks like when they’re telling a truth. “Yes. I’d really, really like that.”</p>
<p>Gen releases Senku’s hand.</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Senku says, stretching and flexing the fingers. “I think I needed that.” A pause, and then Senku dips forward, smushes his face in his hands. “Ughh, Gen, when did we get this sappy?”</p>
<p>“It’s called honesty, dear Senku,” Gen snickers. “Our friends Chrome and Kohaku took the liberty of teaching me. It’s necessary for maintaining healthy relationships. Platonic ones, too,” he clarifies when Senku winces. “Enjoy it while it lasts, I don’t want to do this again for another five hundred years.”</p>
<p>“Agreed. This was awful.” Senku straightens up. “Oh yeah. Also. You’re forgiven.” He taps twice, gently, on the back of Gen’s hand, eyes narrowed like a cat in a pool of afternoon sunlight. Gen can’t help himself; he smiles right back.</p>
<p>“Give me your other hand, will you?”</p><hr/>
<p>Chrome is fast asleep under the tree outside the science hut, snoring. Curled on either side of him are Suika and Chalk. An ominous shadow looms over them.</p>
<p>“Let him sleep. You know how hard he’s been working,” Kohaku says, stopping Senku in his tracks. She grabs him by the collar and drags him a safe distance away.</p>
<p>“Ahh—You’re <em> strangling </em> me,” he gasps, flailing. He rights himself, scowling, and sticks a finger in his ear. “Fine, fine, I’ll leave him alone for now. But then I’ll need your help instead. I was thinking of building a Newton’s cradle.”</p>
<p>“You know I don’t know any science words, Senku.”</p>
<p>“A Newton’s cradle? It’s not that complicated. Has some cool-as-hell physics involved too...”</p>
<p>Kohaku squints through the trees, lets Senku’s muttering fade into background noise. Compulsive, she checks her surroundings. Birdsong (tiny song birds, not worth the effort it’d take to catch them), the rustle of leaves (a gentle, constant wind coming off the water), the faint scuffing sound of Senku’s shoes as he paces (he’s pointing very enthusiastically at nothing in particular, drawing diagrams in the air). She tunes back in in time to hear the tail end of whatever it is Senku is talking about.</p>
<p>“...so a big part of the Newton’s cradle is conservation of momentum. The interesting thing is that if you pull back two masses instead of one, two masses will be knocked off the other side as the balls go back and forth. There’s this idea that it has something to do with shockwaves getting reflected when the medium changes from metal to air—” Senku blinks over at Kohaku, one gesturing hand still in the air. “What’s with that face?” he asks.</p>
<p>Kohaku hates that she can’t repress her smile. Senku doesn’t need the encouragement. But (gratifyingly) he does smile back. The sunlight makes his eyes shine, all rubies and dying fire. His gaze shifts to somewhere over her shoulder.</p>
<p>“Hey, mentalist,” he says.</p>
<p>“Miss me?” Gen coos. “Thought I should get some fresh air.”</p>
<p>“The air’s the same inside the lab,” Senku scoffs. </p>
<p>“It’s the feeling that matters.” Gen takes a seat in the shade. It’s impossible to tell if he’s being serious.</p>
<p>“Do you know how a Newton’s cradle works?” Senku settles down beside Gen. “I was telling Kohaku about it.” He squints up at her. “Are you going to stay?”</p>
<p>(Kohaku’s sight is too sharp to miss the way his eyes crinkle at the corners when she says yes. Her heart warms immediately against her will—insufferable as he might be, he’s still her friend.)</p>
<p>The sun has gotten a lot lower in the sky by the time Senku finally gives them a break.</p>
<p>“So when this imaginary ball hits this other imaginary ball, they magically stick together and fly off somewhere a little bit slower than the first ball. Great. Why do I need to know all this again?” Kohaku asks as Senku dusts off his dirt-smeared hands.</p>
<p>“It’s cool!” He practically beams, gesturing at the giant pictures and symbols he’s scrawled in the dirt.</p>
<p>“I think it takes a very particular kind of person to find that <em> cool</em>,” Gen murmurs. “Useful, maybe, and I’ll be forever grateful that you know all this, but you might be the only one that thinks quantitative analyses of collisions are cool, my dear.”</p>
<p>Much less diplomatic, Kohaku crosses her arms and grumbles, “It’s just a lot of fancy ideas and complicated words. Don’t expect me to remember all this.”</p>
<p>She leans back against the tree with a groan when Senku says, “You’ll have to remember <em> some </em> of it. After all, we’re just getting started! I know this first part was rough, and it always takes a lot of time, but once you get the hang of it, it’s fairly intuitive. We can continue tomorrow.”</p>
<p>“Tomorrow?” Kohaku makes a show of thinking. “Ah, sorry, I can’t, I’ll be busy doing pretty much anything else.”</p>
<p>Senku snickers. “Liar.”</p>
<p>“Don’t be rude now, Senku dear.” Gen is smiling.</p>
<p>“It’s fine, you don’t have to. I’ll just teach Gen,” Senku says, offering his creepiest grin.</p>
<p>Gen shoots Kohaku a sly look. “Abandoning me, dear? You’re happy to leave me all alone at Senku’s mercy?”</p>
<p>“Hey, I’m not that bad.”</p>
<p>Kohaku makes a face at him. “You <em> are </em> that bad, when it comes to talking about science. Don’t drag me into it—I don’t stand a chance. You can handle the thinking part, I’ll do the fighting and hunting, deal?”</p>
<p>Senku shrugs, a hint of a smile on his face. “Sure, fine.”</p>
<p>She pats Gen’s knee apologetically. “Looks like it’s just you. You probably know more than I do anyway, since you’re from the old world and all.”</p>
<p>Gen pats her knee right back, wearing a truly impressive poker face. “Oh no, I have to forgo intense physical labour with Kohaku to sit around and listen to Senku talk abut physics for hours? How terrible!”</p>
<p>There’s a pause that lingers just a few seconds too long. The way Senku and Gen’s eyes flit to each other suggests something vulnerable, a complicated negotiation she’s only part of the way to understanding before it’s over.</p>
<p>Then Senku laughs and the moment is gone.</p>
<p>“I can keep it qualitative, if it’s really getting frustrating. You don’t have to dive into the mathematics to get an appreciation for how fascinating this stuff is.”</p>
<p>“How exciting,” Gen coos. Then he frowns in Chrome’s direction following a particularly loud snore. Chalk whines and paws at the air, caught in a dream.</p>
<p>“Should we wake him up?” Kohaku asks. She prods Chrome and he rolls onto his side, still snoring. “I don’t understand how you sleep in the same hut as him, Senku,” she mutters.</p>
<p>Senku nods sagely. “My dad used to snore like that too. You get used to it, eventually. I think he’s had enough rest for one day. Let’s wake him up.” </p>
<p>“On it,” Kohaku says. She smacks Chrome on the arm. Gen winces sympathetically.</p>
<p>Chrome snorts, blinks blearily at them. “Oh, hey guys,” he grunts. “What are you doing?” With all the shifting, Suika and Chalk blink themselves awake too.</p>
<p>“You remember what I was telling you about momentum?” Senku asks, brightening at the prospect of more students.</p>
<p>Chrome immediately perks up like a puppy being promised a bone. “Yeah! You were just getting to the part about perfectly elastic collisions.”</p>
<p>“Oh!” Suika says. “I think I remember that. That was the thing with the balls of clay, right?”</p>
<p>Senku nods and launches into a lecture with relish, radiating an easy warmth that comes out in precious few other situations. He and Chrome and Suika huddle close over the diagrams scratched in the ground, delighted mirrors of each other, the rest of the world forgotten, and Gen and Kohaku exchange fond, secret grins behind their backs. </p><hr/>
<p>Senku and Gen make themselves comfortable outside the lab, on opposite sides of the doorway. Gen is settled with his back against the wall, watching the sunlight cut through the treetops, noting the way the shadows shift with every rustle of the leaves. Senku, mere metres away, is drawing up plans for his next experiment using a sheet of paper splayed open on a wooden plank. (“You’re going outside?” Senku had asked. “I’ll be out in a minute. Keep you company.”) </p>
<p>Birds chitter, cicadas drone, and the two of them are content to enjoy each other’s company in silence.</p>
<p>Then: “Hey, Senku.”</p>
<p>“Hm?” He’s barely paying attention, scribbling what appears to be a backward letter ‘e’ on his paper. “What?”</p>
<p>“Love you,” Gen says without inflection.</p>
<p>Senku sets down his pen, cocks his head, expression softening a fraction. “Yeah?”</p>
<p>“Yup.” Gen breathes out slow and even, lets his shoulders relax.</p>
<p>“Sap.” It sounds less and less like an insult each time Senku says it. “You’re so…” He leans backward, nearly toppling over as he waves at nothing.</p>
<p>“Cringey?” Gen supplies with a smirk.</p>
<p>Senku snorts. “I was going to say <em> good</em>. You’re getting really good at the whole telling people what you’re feeling thing.”</p>
<p>“Thank you,” Gen says mildly. Suddenly, the perfect weather is just a little too warm. “You are too.”</p>
<p>Senku dismisses that idea out of hand. “I need more practice. Come here and sit with me? I...I’d like to tell you what I’m working on.”</p>
<p>Gen considers teasing Senku for the resolutely wide-eyed way he’s staring, but he’s nicer than that. He grants himself the indignity of just scooting over to Senku’s side, ignoring how his clothes are getting dragged through the dust and dirt.</p>
<p>For a while, it’s just the two of them, talking about math that’s really far too complicated for Gen to comprehend. Still, he listens, and when Gen gives up on even trying to follow, Senku tilts his head thoughtfully and lets Gen show him some magic tricks he’s been working on.</p>
<p>A smattering of birdsong comes from somewhere in the trees. Senku lifts his head toward the far side of the clearing and points. “House sparrow.”</p>
<p>“Oh? Where?”</p>
<p>Senku shifts, moving easily into Gen’s space and nearly bumping their heads together. He points over Gen’s shoulder. “Up in that branch, a bit to the left of the first fork. You see it?” The sensation of Senku’s breath on Gen’s ear is still enough to make his stomach do flips, but there is something diminished, manageable in its intensity. It is almost comfortable.</p>
<p>“Ah, I see it. That was fast, my dear.”</p>
<p>Senku shrugs, narrows his eyes in that way of his that radiates contentment. “Their camouflage is amazing, but we tend to notice when what we thought were pieces of bark start hopping around and chirping.”</p>
<p>“Oh, look.” Gen points. “There’s another one. You see? Two branches up and a little further to the left.”</p>
<p>Senku laughs. “You’re just as fast as me, mentalist.” He taps Gen on the arm, twice, gentle, before leaning back to a more reasonable distance. “Bet you can’t spot more than me in an hour though.”</p>
<p>Gen smiles his most dangerous smile. “The usual rules?”</p>
<p>Senku’s returning grin is just as wicked. “You know it.”</p>
<p>“Ready?”</p>
<p>“Set.”</p>
<p>“Go!”</p>
<p> With Gen’s shout, the two sparrows they spotted shoot out of the trees, taking flight into the clear blue sky. Gen laughs, not even caring that he’s wasting precious seconds of the game not bird-watching. Senku bares all his teeth when this draws Chrome and Kohaku’s attention and they demand to join the game.</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter whether Senku ever says it or not. Laughter and arguing fill the clearing. They all already know.</p>
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  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>shoutout to <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/chronique/pseuds/chronique">chronique</a> for reading over parts of this! go check out their work, it's not dr. stone but it's very good.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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